There was outrage when tech company Artisan plastered the London underground with adverts exhorting employers to “stop hiring humans” — and opt for one of their so-called AI employees instead. But the viral marketing stunt hit a particularly raw nerve for graduates looking for their first job.
“It’s a horrendous time to be a graduate,” Sally Wynter, a young London entrepreneur running a popular TikTok account dedicated to helping people find their first jobs, tells me. “Junior roles are shrinking. Companies are actively hiring less junior talent. Previous years’ graduates from 2023-24 are still looking for their first role, [which is] bumping up competition.”
Wynter hears daily from university leavers who are foundering in their job hunt. “They have been mis-sold a promise. Go to uni, work hard [and] employers will line up for you. The reality is 600-800 applications before they land a job.” Job hunting is now a job in itself, with hundreds of applicants vying for each role. “Everything is hyper-competitive,” says Wynter. “You can’t just hit apply on your third application and ‘boom’, you’ve got the job like it was with our parents’ generation.”
Advertisement "Stop Hiring Humans" pic.twitter.com/WjStPx2yMA
— Truthseeker (@Xx17965797N) June 9, 2025
It’s beginning to look like the Hunger Games on jobs boards. Vacancies for entry-level roles are down 32 per cent since ChatGPT launched in November 2022, according to job search platform Adzuna. Job search site Indeed reports that graduates are facing the toughest job market since 2018, with the number of graduate roles dropping 33 per cent in the past year.
Even AI’s creators appear concerned that their products could be about to eat graduates’ lunch. In May, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei warned that AI products such as Claude — Anthropic’s large language model (LLM) and ChatGPT competitor — could eradicate half of all entry-level office jobs over the next five years.
Take any narratives pushing the power of AI with a hefty dose of salt; reducing headcount is part of LLM makers’ pitches to sell their products to businesses. Companies are laying off staff at all levels. April’s National Insurance and wage hikes have led to headcount reductions. Businesses looking for cheaper labour are certainly embracing AI, but they are also offshoring roles to countries where salaries are lower. But taken together, it’s painting a bleak picture for young people at the start of their careers.
@sallyhooha It’s not all doom and gloom 👻 #graduate #job #jobmarket #entrylevel #realestate
♬ original sound - Sally | Graduate Jobs 🤓
It’s not graduates’ fault that universities have failed them, Gary O'Sullivan told me. As managing partner at consulting firm Sia, he said graduates “are paying the price” for courses failing to develop students’ AI skills. “As AI reshapes everything from marketing and law to healthcare and finance, there’s a growing disconnect between what graduates are taught and what employers now expect,” said O’Sullivan.
As he points out, the 2025 Higher Education Policy Institute found only 36 per cent of undergraduates were receiving support to develop essential AI skills. “Without embedding practical AI competencies across disciplines, graduates risk entering the workforce theoretically literate but practically adrift,” adds O'Sullivan
Recruitment agency BrighterBox, which specialises in placing graduates at start-ups, has seen AI’s impact on the hiring process. “Some product-led or tech start-ups — particularly in their early stages — are leaning into AI to run leaner teams, and that can mean fewer hires overall,” BrighterBox founder Charlie Johnson tells me.
Entry-level jobs often encompass the more drudge-work, learning-the-ropes elements of business that AI seeks to replace. Plus, one of the big promises of AI is increased productivity, and companies are embracing this opportunity to keep headcount low.
“We’ve definitely hired less due to AI, our team is so much more productive,” says Marc Munier, CEO at DitchCarbon, an AI-powered emissions intelligence company. But that doesn’t mean they’re cutting underlings. “We can hire less experienced people at lower salaries, and they output the same as someone more senior,” adds Munier.
“AI has slowed down the need for new heads as you want your existing team to do more with AI tools,” Glen Calvert, co-founder and CEO at Kaizan, an AI client service platform, explains. “If I were hiring grads, I’d be looking for AI fluency and curiosity as must-haves now.” Graduates need to show they’re prepared to work with AI, surmises Johnson. “The expectation now is that junior hires come in with a proactive mindset and are already experimenting with AI, not waiting to be trained on it.”
Despite the recent panic over university students’ wholehearted embrace of ChatGPT for writing assignments, ironically it could be these self-taught AI skills that bag them a first job.
Wynter believes younger jobseekers can turn this to their advantage. “Much of Gen Z use ChatGPT as their ‘Google’ — they’re more familiar with AI than their millennial and boomer counterparts,” she says. Wynter recently launched Hunch, an AI-powered tool for graduate jobseekers to find them open roles and coach them through applications.
Demis Bril, a senior director at workspace experts Instant Offices, says businesses should ensure they hire graduates and train them in AI-specific pathways. “Companies that empower graduates to use AI responsibly and creatively won’t just attract top talent, they’ll shape the future of work,” he says.
This position makes more sense than companies shedding entry-level jobs entirely. It’s a false economy to save money on salaries and training in the short term — but fail to invest in the mid- and senior-level employees of the future. Every ladder needs a bottom rung.
“AI helps replace the grunt work but doesn’t replace the smartest grads,” says Mohshin Patel, co-founder of investment platform Cur8 Capital. “That can disadvantage less polished candidates who, in previous years, might have had time to grow into roles. It’s also raised the bar — we expect more polish and precision up front.”
Good luck, class of 2025.
