Organizations Must Redesign Early Career Roles and Development to Enable Higher-Value Work

The 4Q25 Gartner survey of 110 heads of HR also found that 95% of organizations have implemented AI in some capacity over the last year, but only one-in-five has realized significant or transformational value.

Current AI implementation at most organizations is focused on augmenting and automating many of the less complex tasks traditionally performed by entry-level workers. The result is a mismatch between traditional skill profiles of early career talent and the organization’s remaining lowest-complexity work.

“Organizations that respond by cutting their early career talent pipelines altogether risk creating significant workforce challenges down the road,” said Kaelyn Lowmaster, Director Analyst in the Gartner HR practice. “Instead of eliminating these early career roles, organizations should redefine them to enable earlier contributions to higher-value work and build the talent they will need in the future.”

Eliminating entry-level roles often forces companies to pay premiums for experienced talent that must be hired externally rather than developed internally. Additionally, fewer low-risk on-the-job opportunities to build skills, personal networks and institutional knowledge over time, means that organizations must reorient early career development toward performing more complex tasks and navigating higher levels of ambiguity.

Gartner has identified three approaches CHROs can prioritize to address the growing gap between the capabilities of early career talent and the complexity of work required in AI-enabled environments:

To support this realignment, CHROs should conduct a detailed analysis of the workforce capabilities that underpin the organization’s most critical value streams. Mapping the impact of AI investments on those skills and competencies can help organizations identify high-change, high-value job families where shifting work across roles is likely to have the greatest impact.

Organizations should begin this analysis at the strategic level by examining the value streams that support critical business capabilities, the workforce capabilities required to enable them and the ways AI is transforming those capabilities through assistance, augmentation, automation or autonomous operation.

“Traditional development approaches are no longer sufficient in an AI-enabled environment,” said Meaghan Kelly, Director Analyst in the Gartner HR practice. “Organizations can’t rely on gradual skill-building through routine work. Instead, they must provide the support structures that allow early career employees to operate effectively in more complex, judgment-intensive roles much earlier in their careers.”

CHROs should partner with business leaders to identify specific risks and co-design a wider range of on-the-job learning solutions. HR must also lead their organization to shift from supporting role mastery to driving employee versatility.

Organizations can address this by providing safety nets, such as tools, guidance, and peer connections that help employees navigate ambiguity while minimizing mistakes and their impact. CHROs should look to adapt training to focus on business acumen and how employees’ specific actions deliver business value.