AI and the Future of Entry-Level Work

PwC and the World Economic Forum have released a joint report examining how AI is transforming entry-level work and what this means for organisations, policymakers, and education systems. Drawing on global data, senior leader interviews, and insights from more than 9,000 entry-level workers across 48 countries, the report frames a challenge that is quickly becoming a boardroom issue: how to balance the productivity gains of AI with the need to sustain future talent pipelines. More than 500 million young people aged 15 to 24 participate in the global labour force today, and the decisions organisations make right now about entry-level hiring and workforce design will shape that pipeline for years.

The numbers in this report deserve close attention from HR professionals. 37% of young workers are employed in occupations with medium to high exposure to AI-driven task change. 45% of entry-level workers report spending more time working because of AI, suggesting that AI is adding complexity and volume to roles rather than simply removing tasks. Most striking, entry-level occupations in the highest AI exposure quartile show around 2.2x higher net skill change than those in the lowest, meaning the skills required to succeed in the most AI-affected roles are shifting at more than double the rate of roles with less AI exposure.

The report explores four areas where leaders need to make deliberate choices: job access (how organisations continue creating meaningful entry routes into work), job design (how roles evolve as AI changes tasks and workflows), talent pipelines (how organisations build future managers and specialists), and education and skill alignment (how learning systems keep pace with workforce needs). Across all four, the report examines where pressure is already emerging and what organisations are doing in response. 28% of entry-level workers believe half or fewer of their current skills will still be relevant in three years, a signal that urgency sits with employees as much as with employers.

The report's central argument is clear: positive outcomes from AI are not automatic. As Peter Brown, Global Workforce Leader at PwC, notes, "The organisations that succeed will be those that take a deliberate approach to AI adoption while continuing to treat entry-level talent and future capability building as strategic priorities." For HR professionals, this is a direct call to treat talent pipeline design not as a downstream consequence of AI adoption, but as a strategic input to it.