Your company just replaced people with AI agents. As a manager, what do you do now?

How you handle the situation affects your team and your business

[Illustration: bestforbest/Adobe Stock]

Block recently made headlines when CEO Jack Dorsey announced it was reducing its workforce and replacing some roles with AI agents. But it wasn’t the first organization to do this. And it won’t be the last.

And in the middle of that announcement—and the LinkedIn hot takes—there are real managers trying to figure out what to say to their teams. That’s the part people want to hear—and need.

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Your Team Is Already Scared—And They’re Watching You

If your organization has made any moves toward AI in the last year—and most have—your team is likely on edge. They’ve watched colleagues get laid off. They’ve heard the buzzwords: “efficiency, “optimization,” “doing more with less.” And now they’re reading the same headlines you are.

What they’re experiencing often has a name: survivor’s guilt. It’s the uncomfortable feeling of still having your job when someone else doesn’t. And it sits right alongside a louder fear: Am I next?

Managers don’t have to have all the answers. But you do have to be intentional about the signals you’re sending. If you talk excitedly about AI tools in front of a team that just watched three colleagues lose their jobs, you’re not leading your team—you’re alarming them. And if you’re avoiding the conversation entirely, your team is filling that silence with side conversations—and their own assumptions.

The most important thing you can do right now isn’t just to adopt the right tools. It’s to have the right conversations.

Get the Language Right

Here’s something to remember: AI agents aren’t teammates. They don’t have a bad week. They don’t need feedback, recognition, or a one-on-one. They’re tools—sophisticated, powerful, often incredibly useful tools—but, nonetheless, tools.

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