Generative AI Is Changing Not Just Jobs, but More Importantly, the Nature of Work

The paper Generative AI and the Reorganization of Labor Demand by Wang et al. (2026) looks beyond the classic question that is so often asked whenever the topic of AI and work arises: which jobs will disappear, and which jobs will be created? This is, of course, a relevant question, but also a limited one. The labor market does not merely change because roles disappear or new ones emerge. A large part of the change takes place within existing roles. And that is exactly what makes the impact of generative AI both so significant and so hard to spot.

The researchers analyzed U.S. online job postings over the period from January 2021 through June 2025. The raw dataset contained over 188 million job postings. The final analysis worked with a sample of more than 9.37 million vacancies. This provides a sharp picture of how employers have been adjusting their demand for labor since the rapid rise of generative AI.

The most important conclusion is that companies are not simply slashing "AI-exposed jobs." The picture is more nuanced. Employers are reorganizing their demand for labor in two ways. On the one hand, the types of vacancies being posted are changing. Demand for certain roles is decreasing, while other roles are actually becoming more important. On the other hand, the content of existing roles is being adjusted. And it is precisely this second effect that is crucial for understanding what AI is truly doing to work.

Because a role can retain the same title, while the nature of the work changes fundamentally. A marketer might still just be called a marketer. But their daily work is shifting. Less time goes into executional writing, manually creating variations, or drafting initial concepts. More time goes into strategy, brand positioning, campaign analysis, quality control, and the smart management of AI tools. The job title therefore remains familiar, but the underlying tasks change.

This applies not only to marketing. The same pattern is visible in fields like consultancy, communications, HR, finance, legal, software development, and customer service. The job title often remains the same, but the balance of tasks shifts. Tasks that are easily automated or augmented by AI become a smaller part of the job. Conversely, tasks centered around human judgment, contextual understanding, creativity, responsibility, and collaboration actually become more important.

This makes the impact of AI on the labor market harder to see than is often thought. It is common to look for clear-cut signals: fewer vacancies for role A, more vacancies for role B, or entirely new job titles like AI specialist, prompt engineer, or AI product manager. But a large part of the change is happening beneath the surface. Not in the job title, but in the daily work itself.

AI changes work task by task, role by role, and organization by organization. Sometimes this is highly visible, for instance when an organization decides to fully automate a process. But much more often, it happens gradually. An employee uses AI to arrive at a first analysis more quickly. A team lets AI draft initial texts. A department uses AI to structure customer queries. A manager uses AI to prepare scenarios. In isolation, these seem like small changes. Together, they amount to a fundamental redesign of work.

This is precisely why it is insufficient to look only at job titles or vacancy numbers. Anyone who merely counts how many jobs are added or lost misses a large part of the real transformation. The labor market is not just changing on the outside, but especially from within. The real shift is not just in which jobs exist, but above all in what people within those jobs actually do.

This also has major implications for organizations. If the content of roles changes, organizations must rethink their job profiles, training, leadership, and career development. Which tasks remain with humans? Which tasks are augmented by AI? Which new skills become important? And how do organizations ensure that employees not only use AI, but also understand how to deploy it well, critically, and responsibly?

For employees, this means that the value of a role lies less and less in performing standard tasks, and more and more in the ability to combine subject-matter expertise, critical thinking, and the capacity to use technology effectively. The question is no longer just: can AI do part of the job? The better question is: how is AI changing the composition of the work, and which tasks are becoming more important as a result?

Generative AI is therefore changing the labor market not only by replacing work, but above all by reorganizing it. That may be less spectacular than the image of jobs disappearing en masse, but it is at least as profound. Because when the content of roles changes, what organizations ultimately ask of people changes with it.

Anyone who truly wants to understand the impact of AI on work must therefore look not only at jobs, but especially at tasks. Not only at job titles, but at work processes. And not only at what is disappearing, but above all at what is shifting.

// About the author

Job van den Berg

Mede-oprichter, AI Keynote Spreker & Techondernemer

Tech-ondernemer (1989) met een achtergrond als socioloog (Research Master (MSc) in statistiek en sociologie) en een van de meest gevraagde keynote sprekers over AI en data in Nederland. Als mede-oprichter van Ai.nl, The Automation Group en Proxies leidt hij engineers die agentic AI van prototype naar productie brengen binnen enterprises. Op het podium vertaalt Job die hands-on praktijk naar concrete strategieën. Eerder was Job Chief Data bij o.a. DPG Media en Kantar. Hij is co-auteur van 5 boeken over AI waaronder 'AI Agents' en 'Handboek AI Strategie' en een veelgevraagd expert in de landelijke media.

LinkedIn