Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff says AI won’t trigger massive white-collar layoffs. Instead, it will boost workforce productivity.
Benioff spoke at the 2025 AI for Good Global Summit with Atlantic CEO Nicholas Thompson. He pushed back on fears of job losses from AI, calling it a “radical augmentation” rather than a replacement.
Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei recently warned AI could wipe out half of entry-level white-collar jobs in five years. Benioff disagrees. 
"That isn’t how I see AI," Marc Benioff said.
"Maybe they have AI, I don’t have. But in the AI I have, it’s not going to be some huge mass layoff of white-collar workers, it is a radical augmentation of the workforce."
Benioff says Salesforce paused hiring engineers, lawyers, and customer service agents for 2025. They want to "let AI productivity really take hold" first.
"Right now, for engineering organization, because of the incredible productivity opportunity, for AI in engineering this year, let’s take some time to actually incorporate that in so we’re not focused on hiring another thousand, 2,000, 3,000 engineers," he explained.
Meanwhile, Salesforce is ramping up sales hires to meet surging demand to deploy AI, expecting a boom in small and mid-market businesses.
"You’re just going to see a lot more SMBs and a lot more general business and mid-market business, because their capabilities are radically amplified by the AI," Benioff added.
Customers aren’t reporting layoffs tied to AI yet, says Benioff. He urges everyone to “shed the fear" around AI’s impact on jobs.
Read more on Salesforce’s AI moves at salesforce.com.
