The Work Isn’t Disappearing… It’s Moving Up The Stack

With every passing week, my feelings on AI shift… dramatically.

Perhaps the biggest shift in my thinking (and actions) happened after my conversation with Avinash Kaushik on this week’s episode of Thinking With Mitch Joel.
It’s not the first time that this has happened.
I rely on Avinash and his thinking because he occupies some rarified air.
Along with big brains and skills that scale both marketing and technology… and a real deep bench on everything from analytics to consumer behavior, he’s a rare marketing bird because he’s worked clients-side (Intuit, Kate Spade, Coach), he’s worked agency-side (Croud) and he spent a boat-load of time at Google in the dynamic moments of media transformation.
Few have this perspective… truly from the inside and from the “doing” not just the thinking.
And he’s “in it”… living in Silicon Valley where the dreams of tomorrow seem like reality today (…maybe).

So…when it comes to AI, this is where Avinash lands: we are not replaceable… but our work is moving up the stack.

And, if you think that’s just hyperbole, I’d recommend you read his article: Analyst 2028: S.H.I.F.T For Relevance.
We need to get past this growing anxiety that AI is coming for our jobs.
That it’s replacing analysts… marketers… developers… knowledge workers.
That the work is disappearing… it’s not.

It’s moving… up the stack.

And that’s a very different challenge.
Because for years… maybe decades… we built entire careers around doing the work.
Pulling the data… building the report… writing the code… launching the campaign… optimizing the system.
We got very good at it.
We built teams around it.
We created new job descriptions… departments… entire industries around it.
And now… much of that work can be done by AI.

Not perfectly… not completely… but enough to change the equation.

Right now, some see something much grander… many are just peeking through the keyhole.
Avinash said it best: It’s not that AI will eliminate the role… it will eliminate the current version of the role.
And that’s where things get interesting.
Because if your value is tied to executing the task and the task can be automated…
Then what, exactly, is your job?
Maybe… just maybe… the path is…
From doing… to deciding.
From executing… to questioning.
From building… to understanding what’s worth building.

It’s a non-subtle shift… it’s substantive.

As Marshall Goldsmith said: What got you here won’t get you there.
And here’s where it gets even more real…
Most organizations aren’t structured for this.
They’re structured around tasks.
Roles… functions… outputs.
Not judgment… ambiguity… or empowered decision-making.

So what happens?

We try to use AI to do the same work…
Instead of defining what the new work actually is.
And that’s where I’m starting to see a lot of companies getting stuck.
AI doesn’t just change efficiency… it brings with it new expectations.

If the machine can do the tasks, then the value shifts to the human who knows what to do with it.

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