Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#1

Post by tylerg » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:37 PM UTC

Junior Roles Aren't Going Away
iamcharliegraham.substack.com

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#2

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:40 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#3

Post by bigyabai » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:46 PM UTC

> First, let's be clear, AI agents do remove roles. At previous companies I founded, I needed a team of developers to build a robust website, integrate it into deployment pipelines, configure hosting, make the UI look good, and handle all the moving parts. I needed marketers to create content, design images in Figma, Canva, and Photoshop, manually research, and write notes to customers and prospects. Now, AI agents can handle a huge portion of that.

I don't believe a word of this. If you replaced your marketers and designers with ChatGPT and a SVG generator, then you shouldn't act surprised when your marketing doesn't work. Your entire thesis statement of "AI agents do remove roles" is unfounded if you refuse to show us metrics to qualitatively compare the success of AI versus human marketing.

How do you know that AI isn't the reason your startups fail to find traction in an AI-saturated market? Do any of your businesses exhibit self-evident runaway success because of AI? It doesn't even sound like you're measuring.

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#4

Post by stalfosknight » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:50 PM UTC

This is bullshit. Junior roles have already been extinct for quite a long time now.

No place that's hiring will give you the time of day until you already have the word "Senior" in your title. But no one can explain where Seniors are supposed to come from though.

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#5

Post by grahac » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:52 PM UTC

bigyabai wrote: post #3

> First, let's be clear, AI agents do remove roles. At previous companies I founded, I needed a team of developers to build a robust website, integrate it into deployment pipelines, configure hosting, make the UI look good, and handle all the moving parts. I needed marketers to create content, design images in Figma, Canva, and Photoshop, manually research, and write notes to customers and prospects. Now, AI agents c…

I agree that AI does not replace the best people in those roles. It can do an average to good job. Maybe it can reach top 40% of the industry? If you need the best UI or best marketing, humans are still netter. Those top human jobs won't go away for a while.

With that in mind, if you just need average to good, AI can do a good job at a tiny fraction of the cost. So the average to good roles will start getting replaced.

As examples, the sites tellmel.ai, and rivalsee.com for example were created without needing a UI or frontend designer. In the past I would have needed to hire a UI employee or consultant to do either of those at a very large expense (especially for the really good ones).

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#6

Post by grahac » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:56 PM UTC

stalfosknight wrote: post #4

This is bullshit. Junior roles have already been extinct for quite a long time now. No place that's hiring will give you the time of day until you already have the word "Senior" in your title. But no one can explain where Seniors are supposed to come from though.

Yeah right now that's certainly true.

But my belief is those companies will soon realize that some of the people who they thought were junior are pretty adept at AI management - more adept than the senior people. And that skill will suddenly be more in demand than how well you can code an optimized sorting algorithm.

Some will get there faster than others of course. But AI is changing things so quickly that it may happen faster than we think, given the state right now.

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#7

Post by Avicebron » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:56 PM UTC

r/LinkedInLunatics is leaking again.

That said I'm glad this founder is able to micromanage his AI, they sound like a very problematic person to actually work with as an engineer, and if screaming into the void of AI means he is no longer sending vague poorly worded demands, I guess that alone might be worth it

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#8

Post by alistairSH » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 4:57 PM UTC

stalfosknight wrote: post #4

This is bullshit. Junior roles have already been extinct for quite a long time now. No place that's hiring will give you the time of day until you already have the word "Senior" in your title. But no one can explain where Seniors are supposed to come from though.

We have a floor full of interns right now. Our India and Mexico offices do as well. Some of them will probably be offered full-time roles.

I hired a junior engineering a few years ago. And have done every few years for about a decade.

I work at a mid-size, PE-owned company that's been around for 50+ years, that operates in the enterprise SaaS space. Junior roles aren't going anywhere. But, the expectations of those junior hires will change (as they have evolved since I was junior myself, way back in the 90s).

Will AI change how we hire and retain talent? Of course.

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#9

Post by stalfosknight » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 5:02 PM UTC

grahac wrote: post #6

stalfosknight wrote: post #4

This is bullshit. Junior roles have already been extinct for quite a long time now. No place that's hiring will give you the time of day until you already have the word "Senior" in your title. But no one can explain where Seniors are supposed to come from though.

Yeah right now that's certainly true. But my belief is those companies will soon realize that some of the people who they thought were junior are pretty adept at AI management - more adept than the senior people. And that skill will suddenly be more in demand than how well you can code an optimized sorting algorithm. Some will get there faster than others of course. But AI is changing things so quickly that it may ha…

I don't mean right now, I mean going as far back as 2018 at least when I had to go through a brutal slog over many months to get my first gig as a new software dev. I eventually ended up in a midlevel role and had to grow into it (I still feel like I found a Willy Wonka golden ticket).

But it is infuriating to see people suggest that there is such a thing as junior level positions and that companies actually want to hire junior level people. That has been absolutely false for a very long time.

Re: Junior Roles Aren't Going Away

#10

Post by stalfosknight » Tue, Jul 08, 2025, 5:03 PM UTC

alistairSH wrote: post #8

stalfosknight wrote: post #4

This is bullshit. Junior roles have already been extinct for quite a long time now. No place that's hiring will give you the time of day until you already have the word "Senior" in your title. But no one can explain where Seniors are supposed to come from though.

We have a floor full of interns right now. Our India and Mexico offices do as well. Some of them will probably be offered full-time roles. I hired a junior engineering a few years ago. And have done every few years for about a decade. I work at a mid-size, PE-owned company that's been around for 50+ years, that operates in the enterprise SaaS space. Junior roles aren't going anywhere. But, the expectations of those j…

Unpaid 20-something interns fresh out of college are not quite the same thing as what I am referring to when I say junior software developer.