If AI Replaces the First Job, Who Will Teach the Next Generation to Think?

For generations, the first job served as an unofficial classroom. It was where young professionals learned far more than technical skills. They developed judgment by making decisions, resilience by recovering from mistakes, and communication by working with colleagues and customers. Long before people became managers or entrepreneurs, they learned how to think.

Artificial intelligence is beginning to change that equation.

As routine, entry-level work becomes increasingly automated, a new question is emerging: if young people no longer gain these experiences through their first job, where will they develop the human skills that technology cannot replace?

For Devi Sahny, Founder and CEO of Ascend Now and The Edge, the answer starts much earlier than most people realise.

Having built two education companies supporting more than 13,000 students and over 120 schools, Sahny believes education must evolve beyond preparing students for exams. Instead, schools should become environments where students learn to think critically, communicate effectively, solve problems, and build resilience long before they enter the workforce.

The First Job Used to Teach More Than Work

One word in the discussion stands out to Sahny: entry-level.

Many entry-level tasks, she argues, have traditionally involved repetitive work rather than deep critical or creative thinking. That makes them particularly vulnerable to automation.

“AI can handle many of the daily tasks quickly, which saves time,” she explains. “But we need to be careful it doesn’t replace our thinking. That’s where the danger is showing up.”

The implication extends beyond the workplace.

If AI can complete the same assignments students are given today, then education itself needs to change.

“If I give a student a task that AI can complete, then my task needs to change, because I haven’t truly challenged them.”

Rather than waiting until graduates enter the workforce, Sahny believes schools should intentionally create opportunities for students to develop judgment, communication, and resilience through experiences both inside and outside the classroom.

After-school activities, internships, entrepreneurship programmes, community projects, hobbies, and collaborative learning all become part of preparing students for a future where thinking—not routine execution—is their greatest advantage.

Schools Should Become a Mini Replica of the Real World

Sahny believes many educators are already moving in that direction.

Communication, for example, is developed every day as students discuss ideas, collaborate on projects, present arguments, and write across different subjects.

Judgment is equally embedded throughout education. Students evaluate evidence, assess the credibility of sources, defend their reasoning, and distinguish reliable information from misinformation—skills that are becoming even more important in the age of AI.

Teachers are also adapting.

As AI-generated assignments become more common, many educators are introducing oral discussions and presentations to better understand how students think rather than simply evaluating what they submit.

“The examples I shared show up in every class and in every country,” Sahny says. “It comes down to intentional teaching and student awareness of the ‘why.’ If students understand why teachers do what they do, it builds support from students and parents, not resistance.”

Building Resilience and Emotional Intelligence

Resilience is another capability she believes schools can—and should—teach deliberately.

Through Ascend Now’s entrepreneurship workshops, students are encouraged to tackle real community problems, experiment with solutions, and view failure as part of the learning process rather than something to avoid.

“We make it clear from the start: it’s okay to fail. We learn from failure, then rebuild.”

The same philosophy extends to social and emotional learning programmes implemented through The Edge, where students build confidence, self-awareness, and emotional resilience through guided discussions and practical activities.

Whether through entrepreneurship projects, sports, creative pursuits, or something as simple as a failed baking attempt, Sahny believes resilience develops when students are given ownership, challenged appropriately, and encouraged to keep trying.

“Schools,” she says, “should become a mini replica of the real world.”

Entrepreneurship Isn’t About Building Startups

When employers say they want graduates who are adaptable, proactive, and entrepreneurial, Sahny believes they are highlighting a gap education has yet to fully address.

Too often, students are rewarded for performing well within existing systems rather than learning how to navigate uncertainty.

“Education often rewards credentials more than it rewards competence in motion,” she says.

Students learn to perform, submit assignments, achieve good grades, and repeat the process. Yet the workplace increasingly rewards something different: ownership.

That is why Sahny is encouraged by the growing adoption of STEM and STEAM education, design thinking, robotics, inquiry-based learning, and project-based education.

These approaches allow students to identify problems, test ideas, iterate based on feedback, and experience ambiguity before entering the workforce.

For Sahny, entrepreneurship should not be viewed as a school club or a pathway reserved for future startup founders.

Instead, it is a mindset.

“The goal shouldn’t be to make every student launch a startup,” she says. “The goal is to train students to become responsible, active contributors to their world.”

That means learning to solve problems, recognise bias—including their own—adapt when plans change, and continue showing up with integrity when challenges arise.

Gen Z Isn’t Rejecting Success. They’re Redefining It.

Sahny also believes today’s students view careers differently from previous generations.

Success is no longer defined solely by earning a degree, securing a stable job, and steadily climbing the corporate ladder.

Instead, many young people are developing a clearer understanding of their own strengths, motivations, and preferred ways of working.

“They’re aware of themselves,” she says. “Their strengths, their limitations, what energises them, what drains them, and what kind of life they want to build.”

Rather than pursuing titles for their own sake, many are looking for work that aligns with both their professional ambitions and personal values.

In conversations with business leaders, Sahny has noticed another shift.

The strongest candidates increasingly focus less on selling themselves and more on demonstrating how they will contribute.

“They show up with clarity about what they’ll contribute, what they’ve already figured out, and how they’ll approach the company’s reality.”

That mindset reflects ownership rather than entitlement.

It is less about finding security and more about finding alignment.

Final Thoughts: The Future Belongs to Those Who Know How to Think

As AI continues to automate routine work, Devi Sahny believes entrepreneurial thinking will become as fundamental as literacy and numeracy.

Not because every student needs to become a founder, but because every student will need the ability to solve unfamiliar problems, think independently, and adapt continuously.

“When AI makes ideation and execution cheaper and faster,” she says, “the bottleneck shifts away from access to information or technical ability and toward something deeper: judgment, creativity, ethical decision-making, and persistence.”

Those qualities cannot be downloaded, outsourced, or automated.

They must be developed.

For generations, schools prepared students for their first job.

The challenge now is preparing them for a world where that first job may no longer teach what it once did.

If AI changes where work begins, education must rethink where thinking begins.

Read the Chinese article here.

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