Yan Hong: AI Reshaping Corporate Employment and Valuation Systems

Topic: 2026 Boao Sina Finance Night

The “2026 Boao Sina Finance Night” event was held on March 25 in Boao, with the theme “Intelligent Competition for the Future: Industry Revolution and New Global Rules in the AI Era.” Yan Hong, Vice Dean of Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Chair Professor of Finance, stated that AI’s impact on corporate employment manifests in two dimensions: one is that some jobs are directly replaced by AI, and the other is that AI becomes a tool to enhance job capabilities.

Taking the education sector as an example, AI can undertake knowledge dissemination tasks, promoting a return to the fundamental goal of education—developing abilities; for programmer roles, AI features both augmentation and substitution. Tasks that originally required 10 people to complete app development can now be done by 2 with AI assistance, forcing the industry to redefine job efficiency and value. Such changes will have significant impacts on overall organizational structures and market valuations of companies.

He mentioned, “Two or three years ago, computer science graduates were still highly sought after in the market. Even at top universities like Carnegie Mellon University in the United States, it has become increasingly difficult for graduates to find jobs.” Yan Hong pointed out that the quality and complexity of code written by AI have surpassed that of ordinary programmers, causing many basic coders to lose competitiveness. Currently, only a very small number of top-tier programmers who can master AI and possess architecture design skills are still in high demand by large companies. Many Chinese and American tech giants are even beginning to reduce recruitment for pure coding positions, relying instead on AI to generate code.

He discussed that the role of “Prompt Engineer,” once considered a hot trend, may have already disappeared before it even fully took shape. “Initially, it was necessary to learn how to ask AI questions specifically, but now AI’s understanding ability has greatly improved, and you can get answers just by asking casually. If users don’t know how to ask questions, another AI can even assist in optimizing the queries.” The rapid disappearance of this role reflects the fast pace of AI technological iteration.

Unexpectedly, Yan Hong pointed out that one of the most resilient and hardest-to-replace roles today is that of electricians. He cited a report from BOSS Zhipin showing that last year, the profession with the highest employment growth was electricians. With large-scale construction of data centers worldwide, the demand for electrical infrastructure has surged. The physical operations and complex environmental adaptability involved in electrical work make it difficult for AI and embodied robots to replace in the short term. “Although robots may replace electricians in the future, it will take at least a few years,” Yan Hong judged.

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Editor: Li Siyang