AI Won’t Replace You. But a Smaller, Smarter Team Might

The Player-Coach model is the future of leadership. The question is - have you spent so much time managing that you've forgotten how to work?

AI is everywhere, and the media keeps repeating the same story—industries transformed, millions of jobs automated.

But here’s what they miss: AI isn’t replacing people. It’s changing who gets hired, how work is done, and what makes businesses competitive.

And for corporate leaders, that means one thing: Your workforce strategy is about to get flipped on its head and you might need to brush up on your execution skills.

The Myth of AI vs. Humans

I’ve helped many companies adjust to major technology leaps. I’ve even built a consumer bank digital first, with no headquarters nor physical asset. So I’ve see how people struggle with knowing when to get engaged.

Part of what we grapple with as a technology leader is a familiar pattern that plays out time and time again. First, there’s the hype (technology X will change EVERYTHING, followed shortly thereafter by the panic (just how bad will this be for me, my team, my company, my industry. Will I/we get left behind?

But history tells a different story.

What generally happens isn’t mass unemployment (though that is still possible). Instead, new specialisms arise and workers need to adapt. We shift what work looks like.

AI isn’t removing the need for people, but it is reshaping teams, trimming the middle layers of organizations, and making small, high-output teams the new standard.

I spoke with Jacob Bank, founder of Relay (and former head of Gmail at Google). Relay helps create AI Agents that work for you and he described the future of work perfectly in a recent conversation we had:

“We’re going to have smaller companies first of all. If your entire job is coordinating what thousands of people do, but companies don’t need thousands of people anymore, what happens to that role?”

That’s the real disruption: AI is making coordination-heavy roles obsolete while making strategic, high-leverage employees indispensable.

Do you (still) know how to be a Player Coach?

In the past, organizations thrived on layers of management. Now, the highest-value employees are those who can think strategically and execute at a high level - what Jacob refers to as Player-Coaches.

These are people who can think strategically and execute effectively—those who can both set the vision and do the work. This is an incredibly valuable combination. But corporate leadership roles don’t always produce great player coaches.

Jacob put it this way:

“If your only job is to take a draft and turn it into a polished document, that job won’t exist. But if you can guide AI, tweak its output, and understand how it fits into a broader strategy, you’re more valuable than ever.”

In this new model of work:

AI is wiping out corporate bloat and communication overhead. The old model of managers managing managers? Gone. The future belongs to small, high-impact teams where strategy and execution are inseparable. This also means Junior execution roles will be dramatically reduced and only those executives that can both think and build will thrive.

The irony? AI isn’t replacing people. It’s making work more human by eliminating the boring stuff and and shifting value to creativity, decision-making, and judgment.

Do we really need a pre-meet for the Steering Committee?

For legacy companies and start-ups alike, the implications are massive.

Jacob shared how his own startup, Relay, has built an AI-driven team that’s half the size of a typical SaaS company at their stage. But they’re still getting the same amount of work done.

“A couple of years ago, we’d already be at 20 people. Instead, we’re 9. I used to think we’d need to hire a marketer, but AI plus me got the job done.”

This isn’t a one-off. I’m seeing it in my own consulting work, and across industries, leaders are realizing:

We don’t need more people. We need the right people, amplified by AI.

What does that mean for corporate jobs?

1. Lean teams will be the new normal – Who needs a bloated org chart when you can use tools like Relay? Lean teams run more efficiently and can now do more with fewer organizational overheads.

2. The middle layer of organizations will shrink – If most coordination tasks can be automated, why keep as many managers? Do we really need a pre-meet for the Steering Committee?

3. Execution speed will define winners and losers – The fastest companies to adopt AI will be the ones that ship faster, make better decisions, and get ahead.

And if you’re in a corporate leadership role, ask yourself: Does my team firmly have two feet planted in the past, or are we already looking ahead?

What Leaders can do to stay ahead

If you lead a corporate team today, here’s what to do before AI-driven competitors, or your C-suite/Board forces your hand (and they eventually will).

1. Identify Your “High-Leverage” Employees

The best hires today are those who don’t need a pyramid of support hires to get things done. They come to you with results, not problems. They are people who:

• Can work autonomously (AI as a coach and peer eliminates most hand-holding)

• Understand how to guide AI (prompting, refining, and integrating AI into workflows) and know what good looks like (e.g I can tell a good marketing pitch from a bad one)

• Bridge strategy and execution (they haven’t become a professional manager and can execute like true player-coaches)

2. Audit Your Team for “Coordination Cost”

Gone are the days of having a safe, fulfilling job writing status reports. If 50% of someone’s time is spent managing processes instead of doing actual work, that role is at risk to apps like Relay that automates tasks and workflows.

So ask yourself:

• Which roles exist mostly to manage other roles?

• Where do approvals and bottlenecks slow us down?

• How many people just update spreadsheets, manage steering committees, make the weekly status report etc?

These are the low hanging fruit for AI Transformation.

3. Rethink Your Hiring Strategy

Instead of hiring the same way you always have, build teams with AI in mind:

• Instead of hiring a new person to fill a vacancy, proactively design a smaller, more effective team by automating and redistributing their tasks.

• Instead of a full marketing team, hire one strong strategist and let AI handle content creation/ad buy.

• Instead of layers of middle managers, hire fewer, high impact leaders who can drive outcomes.

It’s a big shift, but early adopters are already doing it. Fear won’t get you anywhere.

4. Train Your Organization to Work With AI

Most companies aren’t moving fast enough because their employees don’t know how to work with AI.

There a disconnect here - 98% of CEOs know AI will transform thier business but only 58% of Executives have received training.

The best thing you can do right now? Invest in your AI fluency.

I started creating Future Work content because I needed to more deeply understand how AI would change the way we work and I couldn’t find content that I enjoyed. Not everyone has the time to write, but at the very least I’d encourage you to:

1. Figure out how to use AI tools in your daily workflows. Teach your team.

2. Understand where human judgment still matters and hire for it.

3. Learns how to manage AI, not be managed by it. This means starting now.

Because AI won’t eliminate jobs but you might find yourself working alongside agents before long.

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AI Won’t Replace You. A More Agile Competitor Might

“People think AI is replacing work. It’s not. It’s making work different.” – Jacob Bank

The future of work isn’t AI vs. humans. It’s AI-powered humans vs. everyone else.

My co-founder Alex and I are building an AI-Native transformation consultancy. We are getting further ahead with fewer resources and the latest tools transformed our service offering to be more data-led, insightful and leverage more advanced work automation tools. And we have a team of two. This was unheard 2-3 years ago.

There’s never been a better case to be an early adopter!

Leaders, companies and teams that figure this out now will be leaner, faster, and more profitable. Those that don’t? They’ll still be having committee meetings about whether to integrate Microsoft Co-Pilot into Teams while their competitors have already automated half their workflows.

If AI won’t replace you, will your competitors? What’s your strategy for staying ahead? Let’s discuss