We have a floor full of interns right now. Our India and Mexico offices do as well. Some of them will probably be offered full-time roles.
I hired a junior engineering a few years ago. And have done every few years for about a decade.
I work at a mid-size, PE-owned company that's been around for 50+ years, that operates in the enterprise SaaS space. Junior roles aren't going anywhere. But, the expectations of those junior hires will change (as they have evolved since I was junior myself, way back in the 90s).
Will AI change how we hire and retain talent? Of course.
We, at a large Dutch bank, also do have 20+ interns but 0 positions for them in IT department. Leadership is projecting that if you do well in internship then you'll be hired. But no interns were hired in last 2 years...
People have been asking the executive class this for a long while now: why don’t you care about training? Their response has ever been silence or threats or that’s what school is for. Do it on your own time, after the 50+ hours we demand from you. Some places get it and had a proper pipeline to train. A vast majority do not. And now they give us this. Great bunch of folks.
Basically the idea is become a senior at your own expense. Work for years without pay and only then get a job if and only if the new AI models by that time hasn't made mid or senior level engineers redundant as well.
Key phrase is you hired them a few years ago. That’s not helpful in the discussion now.
Edit: Missed this was in response to “extinct for a long time” which makes more sense. It is true that it is an entirely different world than three years ago.
I hired a junior engineering a few years ago. And have done every few years for about a decade.
I work at a mid-size, PE-owned company that's been around for 50+ years, that operates in the enterprise SaaS space. Junior roles aren't going anywhere. But, the expectations of those junior hires will change (as they have evolved since I was junior myself, way back in the 90s).
Will AI change how we hire and retain talent? Of course.