Former Meta executive warns ‘nothing would ever be the same’, builds AI tools to help Gen Z find work

AI is making hiring harder and former Meta and Salesforce executive Clara Shih has noted that the new technology has made it the worst-entry level job market in 37 years. The new graduates are now entering a workforce where every job is an AI job now and Shih wants to help them land a job using her new non-profit New Work Foundation which is desgined to train Gen Z for a future dominated by AI agents.

"In that moment I knew that nothing would ever be the same," she told Fortune. "You feel radicalized in that moment when you see it working."

At the same time, she noticed that the children of friends and familyincluding Ivy League graduates were finding it ‘practically impossible’ to land jobs.

Shih believes the only way forward is to arm the incoming workforce with the exact technology threatening to replace them.

"If you want to find a job and if you want to keep your job, you need to learn how to get really good at using AI agents," she told Fortune

One of the tools launched is called Field Report. It offers job seekers a look at the current state of their preferred career path. For example, a user looking into a career in law will see that while there are 31,500 open roles in the US with low competition, the risk of AI automation in that specific field is very high.

Another tool launched by the foundation is called JobClaw. The AI agent is aimed at helping job seekser find roles based entirely on their strengths and interests. The tool requires no resume and users can simply fill out a five-question intake form detailing who they are and what they actually want out of a career.

A Gallop survey found that Gen Z's excitement and hope around AI have plumeeted while anger around the technology has risen. The poll noted that while excitement around the technology dropped from 36% to 22% in the last year, anger around it rose from 22 to 31% while anxiety around it remains at 42%.

However, Shih reportedly believes that the exact people rejecting the technology are the ones who are most critical to its safe evolution.

“The people who have moral objections to AI, those are actually the people that I want involved, making sure that we steer these systems in the right direction,” Shih said.