AI Role Restructing: Are You Cutting Fat — or Muscle?

Over the past few months, the headlines have been relentless.

• Microsoft laid off 7,000 people.
• Salesforce cut 1,000.
• IBM, Meta, Google, Workday, Dell, and even UPS followed with their own waves.

The common thread? AI is forcing a structural shift — and organizations are moving fast to adapt.

But in the rush to "streamline" and "automate," I see a bigger risk emerging:

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Companies are not just trimming fat — they’re losing muscle.

They’re shedding not only duplicative roles, but also high-potential mid-level leaders, deeply trusted operators, and culture carriers. And when that happens, performance cracks don’t show up right away — they appear months later in missed goals, dysfunctional teams, and stalled momentum.

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Who’s Most at Risk?

From what I’ve seen inside large financial firms, tech startups, and investor-backed companies, the same three groups tend to get hit hardest — and often unfairly:

Executional Leaders – Project owners and operational drivers who may not (yet) be fluent in AI tools but know how to get things done across teams.

Human Bridges – Managers and team leads who keep communication flowing and trust intact — often without formal recognition.

Organizational Linchpins – The ones who hold the institutional memory and make systems work — quietly and consistently.

These aren’t the people slowing companies down. They’re the ones holding it together.

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What Forward-Thinking Companies Are Doing Instead

In the smartest organizations I work with, leadership teams are asking a better question:

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Not just “Who do we let go?” but “Who do we need to grow?”

They’re shifting from reduction to reinvention — and using this AI pivot as a moment to double down on their most strategic people.

They're:

-Investing in coaching for high-potential leaders to evolve their roles

-Building influence, adaptability, and decision-making skills into leadership programs

-Making AI fluency part of the skillset — but not the only measure of future readiness 

-Re-recruiting their top talent internally before someone else does

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6 Moves to Future-Proof Your People (and Performance)

Here’s the framework I use with my clients to ensure they don’t lose their edge in the AI era:

1. Elevate Decision-Makers, Not Just Doers. Give future leaders more strategic ownership. Shift them from execution to influence.
2. Double Down on Human-Centric Leadership Build the skills AI can’t replicate: emotional intelligence, trust-building, and navigating complexity.
3. Make AI Fluency Part of Leadership Training Don’t silo it. Integrate it. Leaders don’t need to be engineers — but they do need to speak AI.
4. Reward Strategic Thinking Over Busyness Prioritize people who ask better questions, challenge assumptions, and think across functions.
5. Spot Intrapreneurs Early The ones solving problems no one assigned them? They’re your future. Feed them, don’t frustrate them.
6. Be Ruthless About Learning Agility Who’s evolving fast? Who’s resisting change? Invest in those leaning in.

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Because the real risk right now isn’t AI.

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It’s losing the humans who make your business work.

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