Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, confirmed that the American cloud software company has cut 4000 jobs in its customer support division, discussing how artificial intelligence has contributed to reducing the company’s workforce.

Benioff revealed the layoffs during an interview published on Friday on “The Logan Bartlett Show” podcast.

Speaking about AI’s impact on Salesforce operations, Benioff said, “I reduced the number of employees from 9000 to about 5000 because I need fewer employees.”

Salesforce has long been at the forefront of the AI revolution and has built what it calls “Agentforce”—customer service robots.

Salesforce added in a statement: “Thanks to the advantages and efficiencies of Agentforce, we have seen a decline in the number of support cases we handle, and we no longer need to actively fill support engineer positions.”

The layoffs come after Benioff announced over the summer that AI performs up to 50% of the work at Salesforce, headquartered in San Francisco.

Lori Reutiman, a human resources consultant, stated that AI is impacting jobs across many sectors.

Reutiman added, “All across America, there have been layoffs directly attributed to AI,” adding that anyone wanting to keep their job or find work needs to learn new skills.

She said, “If your network could get you a job, it would have already done so. It would have done so yesterday. It’s up to you to broaden your vision and horizons and meet new people.”

Analyst Ed Zitron said technology companies that over-hired during the pandemic blame AI. Zitron added that companies are now trying to attract investors by claiming they are more efficient.

Zitron added, “It’s simply a growth-at-any-cost mentality. Growth is the most important thing, even if it harms people’s lives, even if it leads to company decline and poor product delivery.” (Agencies)