Coursera CEO’s high ideas for grads to remain aggressive as AI takes jobs

With entry-level jobs declining as employers proceed to deploy AI, Coursera’s CEO has shared his high ideas for graduates to remain aggressive within the job market and stand out in interviews.

Greg Hart, former technical advisor to Jeff Bezos at Amazon, grew to become president and CEO of on-line studying platform Coursera in February 2025. He instructed CNBC Make It that within the age of AI, it is vital for younger folks to pursue extra studying alongside a level.

“The recommendation that I give to my sons… is without doubt one of the finest issues that you are able to do is to reinforce your college diploma with micro credentials particularly,” he stated within the interview.

Micro credentials are brief programs that present a certification for a selected talent or data they usually take much less time to finish than a conventional diploma or diploma. It is turn out to be more and more vital to complement levels with extra certifications, as graduate jobs are liable to being changed by AI, Hart stated.

Main companies have been shedding employees this yr and have cited AI as a part of the explanation, from Amazon making 14,000 employees redundant because it bets on AI to Salesforce slashing 4,000 buyer help roles saying AI can do 40% of the duties on the firm.

In the meantime, 62% of U.Okay. employers anticipate that junior, clerical, managerial and administrative roles would be the almost certainly be misplaced to AI, in response to a latest survey of two,019 senior HR professionals and choice makers by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Improvement (CIPD.)

Moreover, the U.Okay.’s Institute for Scholar Employers present in its annual Scholar Recruitment Survey that 1.2 million functions had been submitted for simply 17,000 graduate roles, highlighting the extraordinary competitors and the restricted positions obtainable to younger folks.

“They [micro credentials] reveal to employers that not solely did you get no matter college diploma you are learning, however you augmented that with one thing that’s typically rather more workforce targeted,” Coursera’s Hart added.

As AI dominates, many employees are pursuing upskilling alternatives with LinkedIn’s Expertise on the Rise report, earlier this yr discovering that AI literacy was the preferred talent that individuals had been including to their profiles.

Hart defined that recent graduates going into job interviews ought to spotlight their character and character traits alongside their expertise.

“Say you are a teen in college proper now, you might be typically going to get employed into your first job based mostly totally on the traits that they see in you,” Hart stated.

“They’ll be assessing your mindset and your traits as a human being greater than your expertise, as a result of by definition, you actually do not have a lot expertise and they also’re not likely hiring you in your expertise, they’re hiring you in your… character traits.”

Hart outlined that “one of the vital vital traits” that employers wish to rent for are “people who find themselves proactive and onerous working and take initiative, who show to be prepared, learners.”

The easiest way to point out these traits is having micro credentials alongside your diploma, particularly ones which are tailor-made to your discipline. For instance, Hart inspired his son, who’s a finance main, to take an extra course on AI for finance.