August 8, 2025
AI is coming for everyone’s jobs, including “incompetent CEOs,” one tech leader says.
As the growing AI wave rocks the workforce, one ex-Google exec is warning corporate CEOs that they could be next.
Mo Gawdat, former chief business officer at Google X, recently appeared on the Diary of a CEO podcast, where he issued a stark warning to business leaders who believe the AI-driven job crisis predicted for the next 5 to 15 years will only affect lower-level employees. According to Gawdat, CEOs could be just as vulnerable to AI disruption as their staff.
“CEOs are celebrating that they can now get rid of people and have productivity gains and cost reductions because AI can do that job. The one thing they don’t think of is that AI will replace them too,” Gawdat said. “AGI is going to be better at everything than humans, including being a CEO. You really have to imagine that there will be a time where most incompetent CEOs will be replaced.”
Gawdat joins a growing chorus of tech leaders sounding the alarm on AI’s impact on the workforce. Companies like Duolingo, Workday, and Klarna have already laid off large numbers of employees or paused human hiring altogether in preparation for an AI-driven future. Meanwhile, fast-food chains and hotels are adopting contactless ordering and kiosk-operated check-ins.
The rapidly changing landscape is why Gawdat is pushing back on the idea that AI will create new jobs. He argues it’s a dangerous myth that downplays the very real threat of widespread job loss.
“My belief is it is 100% crap,” Gawdat said. “The best at any job will remain. The best software developer, the one that really knows architecture, knows technology, and so on, will stay—for a while.”
However, Gawdat argues that AI itself isn’t the true culprit behind looming job losses; it’s the profit-driven CEOs who are choosing the technology at the expense of human workers in their pursuit of greater financial gain.
“There’s absolutely nothing wrong with AI—there’s a lot wrong with the value set of humanity at the age of the rise of the machines,” Gawdat said. “And the biggest value set of humanity is capitalism today. And capitalism is all about what? Labor arbitrage.”
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