Anthropic Engineers Reveal AI Productivity Gains Come With Deep Concerns About Job Security

Anthropic Turns Inward to Show How AI Affects its Own Workforce

Anthropic's blog post said it turned "the lens inward" in August of this year when it surveyed 132 engineers and researchers, doing in-depth interviews and examining its own at data on how its staff were using its own Claude AI system. Simply put, the company says this analysis shows that "AI use is radically changing the nature of work for software developers, generating both hope and concern." AI in the workplace is driving "significant transformations," the report said. Primarily, engineers are "getting a lot more done," which makes it sound like Anthropic's tech really is delivering on the bold promise of AI -- that it can take on mundane or low-level tasks, freeing up workers to be more efficient in achieving productivity goals. At Anthropic, AI is also accelerating workers' learning and iteration speed, and letting them handle "previously-neglected tasks." Naturally this is causing some to worry about the business trade-offs here: some workers "worry that this could mean losing deeper technical competence," the blog notes. Others worry they'll become less able, in time, to "effectively supervise Claude's outputs." Still other people say they use the freedom AI gives to "embrace the opportunity to think more expansively and at a higher level."

Anthropic Engineers Sound the Alarm About AI: 'I'm Coming to Work to Put Myself Out of a Job'

AI tools are improving productivity while leading to concerns about losing skills and jobs. Anthropic recently conducted a research study of its own engineers to determine how AI is transforming work -- and found that AI tools are boosting productivity while sparking concerns about skill atrophy, reduced human collaboration and job loss. Anthropic shared the findings of its August research study in a blog post published on Tuesday. The startup, last valued at $183 billion in September, surveyed 132 of its own engineers, conducted 53 detailed interviews and studied internal use data for Claude Code, its coding tool. The study sought to get a better understanding of how AI use is changing work at Anthropic, a startup with 3,000 employees. "We find that AI use is radically changing the nature of work for software developers, generating both hope and concern," the researchers wrote in the blog post. Engineers reported getting more work done with the help of AI and being able to succeed at a variety of technical tasks beyond their usual expertise. Workers could fully delegate up to 20% of their tasks to Claude, mainly tedious work. Related: Anthropic Is Now One of the Most Valuable Startups of All Time: 'Exponential Growth' Employees were able to tackle a wider range of tasks, but were concerned that they could lose more specialized technical competence in favor of breadth. Many worried about losing deeper coding skills, like writing and critiquing code, with one employee noting in an interview for the study that it is more difficult to learn when coding assistants like Claude are available to readily code solutions. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said in March that AI will write all code for software engineers within a year. "On the jobs side of this, I do have a fair amount of concern," he said that month at an event. Some Anthropic engineers are also worried about their jobs, expressing genuine uncertainty about the future. In the study, one employee noted that it was "hard to say" what their job might look like in the next few years. Others were "optimistic in the short term" but predicted that "AI will end up doing everything" in the long run. One employee said in the report: "It kind of feels like I'm coming to work every day to put myself out of a job." Related: The CEO of a $183 Billion AI Startup Says There's a 'Need to Warn the World' About AI Taking Jobs The addition of AI also means that workplace social dynamics are undergoing significant changes. Employees often go to Claude with questions, rather than their peers, resulting in fewer opportunities for mentorship and collaboration. A separate report on AI in the workplace, released in January by McKinsey, found that nearly all employees (94%) report familiarity with AI tools and the majority of workers (59%) describe themselves as optimistic about AI. Some of the top concerns cited by employees as risks associated with AI are cybersecurity, inaccuracy and workforce displacement.

Anthropic Engineers Reveal AI Is Transforming Workflows, Killing Mentorship, Sparking Fears Of Becoming 'Irrelevant' In AI Era - ServiceNow (NYSE:NOW)

A new internal study from Anthropic shows that AI tools are boosting productivity inside the company while simultaneously eroding collaboration, weakening skill development and fueling concerns about long-term job relevance. AI Productivity Surge Reshapes Developer Workflows Anthropic on Tuesday released findings from an internal August study examining how employees use Claude Code, its agentic AI coding tool. The research surveyed 132 engineers and researchers, conducted 53 interviews and analyzed how the tool is changing daily work. The company found that employees felt more "full-stack" and significantly more productive. Twenty-seven percent of Claude-assisted tasks were projects that would not have happened otherwise, such as scalable builds or data dashboards considered too time-consuming without AI support. Workers also reported that they could "fully delegate" up to 20% of their workload to Claude, especially repetitive or "boring" tasks that were easy to verify. Engineers Warn Of Lost Mentorship, Skill Atrophy But the productivity gains came with major concerns. "Some found that more AI collaboration meant they collaborated less with colleagues," the study noted. One employee said, "I like working with people, and it's sad that I need them less now." Several respondents voiced fear that great technical skills could erode. "When producing output is so easy and fast, it gets harder and harder to actually take the time to learn something," one engineer said. Others questioned their future relevance. "I feel optimistic in the short term, but in the long term I think AI will end up doing everything and make me and many others irrelevant," one employee told researchers. See Also: MrBeast Went From Hiring Comedians And Laptop Salesmen From Best Buy To Building A 400-Person YouTube Empire: 'I Wish I Had A Mentor.' AI Leaders Divided On Automation's Impact On Jobs In September, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said artificial intelligence was likely to replace up to 40% of work tasks in the near future, arguing that AI would reshape tasks more than entire jobs. He predicted some roles would transform, new ones would emerge and others would disappear as AI handled a larger share of daily work. That same month, Kevin O'Leary pushed back against fears of widespread job loss, saying AI was creating better opportunities by removing repetitive tasks. He noted that more than 50 of his companies used AI to cut costs and boost productivity, comparing the shift to past technological transitions like television and radio. In August, ServiceNow Inc. (NYSE:NOW) CEO Bill McDermott said AI had already begun transforming corporate operations, with AI agents managing IT support, customer inquiries and security tasks around the clock. He said the company slowed hiring for what he called "soul-crushing jobs" and predicted more companies would reorganize around AI-driven workflows. Read Next: As Record 40-Day Shutdown Nears End, History Shows Stocks Rally 12 Months Later With S&P 500 Averaging 12.3% Gain Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Photo courtesy: Shutterstock NOWServiceNow Inc$824.38-%OverviewMarket News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs