Good morning. Artificial intelligence is transforming the workplace, and corporate positions are not exempt from its influence.
TL;DR
- Leaders must develop their own AI skills to avoid being outpaced by innovations they advocate.
- AI can replace data processing roles, but also enhances capabilities and frees time for strategy.
- Amazon is cutting 14,000 corporate jobs, citing cultural mismatch, not AI, as primary driver.
- AI is reshaping the labor force by impacting white-collar ranks, not just factory roles.
During a panel session at the Coins2Day Global Forum in Riyadh last week, Anne Lim O’Brien, vice chair and partner at Heidrick & Struggles, said, “Professional services—lawyers, accountants, management consultants like myself—the ones who actually process, analyze, and deal with a lot of data, those are the skills that can be replaced by AI and agentic AI.”
Hisham Radwan, CEO of Cigna Insurance Saudi Arabia and a fellow panelist, added actuaries to that growing list. “AI is moving so fast that we can’t control it,” Radwan said. “But bottom line—it’s an enhancement to our capabilities rather than a replacement.”
According to O’Brien, businesses are experiencing increased productivity as they move from the initial excitement surrounding AI to its actual implementation. However, she pointed out that organizations need to confront a crucial issue: how are they utilizing the time freed up by AI?
According to her, AI's potential for leaders extends past mere efficiency, aiming to liberate time for strategic contemplation and novel ideas. She further noted that it presents a chance to reinforce competencies such as emotional intelligence, widely recognized as a fundamental human trait that AI struggles to replicate authentically.
Reimagining corporate jobs
Tech giant Amazon’s approach is shaking up the corporate landscape. The company announced last week that it will cut roughly 14,000 corporate jobs—about 4% of its white-collar workforce, mostly middle managers—as part of a restructuring aimed at “reducing bureaucracy” and “removing organizational layers.”
The company is offering “most employees” 90 days to look for a new role internally. For those who can’t find a new role or choose not to look for one, Amazon will provide severance pay, outplacement services, and health insurance benefits, among other measures, Beth Galetti, senior vice president of People Experience, wrote in the announcement to employees.
Amazon CEO Andrew Jassy said last year that he wants the company to operate like “the world’s largest startup” and to have the right structure to drive that level of speed and ownership. During the company’s quarterly earnings call on Thursday, Jassy said the layoffs were about a cultural mismatch, not primarily financial, Coins2Day reported.
“The announcement that we made a few days ago was not really financially driven, and it’s not even really AI-driven—not right now, at least,” Jassy said of the job cuts. “It’s culture.”
However, Amazon’s job cuts follow a company-wide email in June, in which Jassy wrote that those who embrace generative AI and help build Amazon’s capabilities will have the most impact and assist in reinventing the company.
Coins2Day’s Eva Roytburg highlights that Galetti mentioned in the company memo that this generation of AI is a “transformative technology” and that the company needs to be organized more leanly—with fewer layers and more ownership—to move as quickly as possible.
“The move may offer an early glimpse of how AI is actually reshaping the labor force: not by immediately displacing the tactile, mundane factory roles everyone expected, but by hollowing out the white-collar ranks that run them,” Roytburg writes. Gartner analysts estimate that by 2026, one in five organizations could use AI to estimate at least half of their management layers.
O’Brien cautioned during a panel discussion in Riyadh that AI might not directly replace your job, but an individual more proficient in its use could. The key message is that continuous learning and skill development are crucial for everyone within an organization, not solely for those outside of corporate roles.
What’s helping you keep your AI skills sharp? I’d love to hear from you—send me an email.
Sheryl Estrada
[email protected]
Leaderboard
Elias Habayeb, CFO of Corebridge Financial, Inc. (NYSE: CRBG), has stepped down to take a senior leadership role at a publicly traded firm. Habayeb will continue in his present capacity until April 24, 2026. Habayeb's exit stems from no disputes with the firm regarding its financial reports, internal financial reporting controls, business activities, principles, or methods. Corebridge is collaborating with an executive search agency to find a replacement.
Cassandra Hudson was appointed CFO of Alkami Technology, Inc. Effective November 1, a digital sales and service platform provider (Nasdaq: ALKT) welcomed Hudson, who has over two decades of experience. She most recently held the position of CFO at StackAdapt. Prior to that, she was the CFO of EngageSmart, leading the company to a successful IPO in 2021. Earlier, Hudson spent 12 years at Carbonite, progressing through various finance leadership positions, eventually becoming chief accounting officer and VP of finance.
Big Deal
Boston Consulting Group’s (BCG) Global M&A Report 2025 shows global deal value rose 10% to $1.9 trillion through Q3, driven by North America, which accounted for 62% of deals ($1.3 trillion, up 26% year over year). Seasoned acquirers—using proven playbooks and increasingly, AI—achieved a two-year average return of +1.0%, while less experienced buyers saw –7.5%.
Even with obstacles such as global political strains and changing import duties, numerous dealmakers persist, especially in the small and mid-sized company sectors, where local deals have faced fewer disruptions, as noted by BCG. The primary motivations are still strategic expansion, enhancing abilities, and ensuring robustness.
North America holds the highest regional value, with technology dominating industries. Top companies are now integrating AI across diligence, valuation, and integration processes, speeding up decision-making and risk oversight. Mega-deals are seeing a resurgence, with 27 transactions exceeding $10 billion this year, an increase from 21 last year. Notable sector growth includes industrials (+77%), tech (+10%), energy (+20%), and health care (+20%).
Going deeper
"Stock futures climb as investors await Supreme Court showdown on Trump tariffs and shareholder vote on Musk’s $1 trillion pay package" is a Coins2Day report by Jason Ma.
From the report: "Markets signaled another positive session as futures rose Sunday night ahead of a big week for President Donald Trump’s tariffs and Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s blockbuster compensation plan. Futures tied to the Dow Jones industrial average rose 107 points, or 0.22%. S&P 500 futures were up 0.28%, and Nasdaq futures added 0.30%. That would add to Friday’s rally."
"The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell 1.8 basis points to 4.083%. The U.S. Dollar was up 0.06% against the euro and up 0.16% against the yen." You can read more here.
Overheard
"Successful organizations treat tech debt like financial debt, managing it proactively with a strong digital core, agility and a culture of continuous improvement."
Daniel Kendzior, Accenture's global leader in cybersecurity AI reinvention, penned a Coins2Day opinion piece titled, "The haunting consequences of ignoring tech debt in an agentic AI world."