JPMorgan’s Workforce Strategy: Attrition Over Layoffs

Jamie Dimon, CEO at JPMorgan Chase, has set out the clearest view yet of how AI will change the workforce at the largest US bank. He says the technology will touch almost every role, tilt hiring towards AI skills and reduce jobs over time.

“There will be all different types of jobs and I think we will be hiring more AI people and fewer bankers in certain categories, and it will make them more productive,” Jamie said in a Bloomberg Television interview at the bank’s China Summit in Shanghai, aired on 21 May 2025.

The bank, which employs more than 300,000 people, already uses AI in risk, marketing and coding. Jamie calls that “the tip of the iceberg”.

He is direct about the destination AI is heading towards. Jamie adds: “I think it will reduce our jobs down the road.”

JPMorgan’s attrition-first model

JPMorgan Chase is relying on natural turnover, not redundancy rounds, as AI reshapes roles. Staff leave as usual and the bank stops refilling certain positions in their old form.

Annual attrition runs at roughly 10%, or about 25,000 to 30,000 departures a year, Bloomberg reports. 

That churn gives the bank room to retrain employees, redeploy people into growing functions and offer early retirement where roles disappear.

In effect, natural turnover becomes the restructuring programme. Jobs touched by AI are redesigned rather than cut, and vacancies are refilled selectively.

The approach signals a shift in emphasis from short-term cost reduction to long-term capability. It also aims to minimise disruption while AI scales across functions.

Standard Chartered quantifies back-office cuts

Standard Chartered, another global bank, is putting numbers on its workforce plan for AI. It intends to remove about 7,800 back-office roles by 2030, more than 15% of its corporate-functions workforce.

Bill Winters, the company’s CEO, draws criticism, reported by Fortune, after saying the strategy replaces “lower-value human capital” with investment capital. 

He adds at the bank’s investor day in Hong Kong in May 2025 that “it is not cost cutting” and says reductions “in favour of the machines” will accelerate as adoption deepens.

The most exposed functions, including compliance, risk and HR shared services, sit in the corporate centre. The support-services workforce stood near 51,000 in mid-2025, underscoring the scale of the overhaul.

Standard Chartered says some affected employees will be redeployed into higher-value roles as demand grows in data, controls and client-facing work.

Hiring continues at Cognizant despite AI doubts

Not every leader is shrinking the front door. Ravi Kumar S, CEO at Cognizant, plans to hire more than 20,000 graduates in 2025 and dismisses warnings of an AI job collapse as “fearmongering”, he tells Fortune.

Ravi argues the winners will measure AI by outcomes rather than usage. That stance runs counter to hiring freezes appearing across parts of the sector as firms test gen AI.

There is data behind his scepticism. Gartner research published in May 2025 finds companies that cut workforces around AI show returns nearly identical to those that do not.

The divergence gives people leaders a choice. Some will reduce roles through attrition and redeployment, while others will keep hiring early-career talent and expect AI to speed up productivity.

What CHROs should do now

Whether firms slow hiring or lean into graduate intake, the era of treating AI as a side project is over. Budgets, governance and incentives need to reflect that.

Workforce planning should be proactive. HR, risk and technology teams can map roles by task, identify which are exposed to automation and design reskilling pathways early.

Communication is critical as clear timelines for role redesign, redeployment opportunities and training will help retain talent and reduce uncertainty.

Firms should set performance metrics that track outcomes from AI, not only usage, and adjust hiring plans as evidence accumulates.

The question for people leaders is no longer whether AI changes the workforce mix. It is whether their organisation manages that change deliberately, through attrition, redeployment and reskilling, or has it forced upon them.