AI Careers Articles - The Batch

The DeepLearning.AI AI Engineering skills map: Building/deploying applications, engineering fundamentals, coding agents, shaping the build

Letters

The AI Engineering Skills Map: Andrew Ng and DeepLearning.AI Present the Essential Skills Every AI Engineer Needs in 2026

I am delighted to present The AI Engineering Skills Map. AI allows us to build software very differently today than in 2022, and everyone with the skills to take advantage of this shift has numerous exciting project and job opportunities.

Professionals collaborate on laptops around a table, indicating diverse roles like marketing and engineering team.

Letters

AI Rewards Generalists Who Can Build New Skills: With AI assistance, full-stack engineers are joined by full-stack recruiters, full-cycle marketers, and more.

As AI increasingly automates coding, it frees up developers to spend time on high-level software development tasks traditionally reserved for senior engineers, like deciding on technical architecture and participating in scoping product requirements.

U.S. map showing universities offering AI Majors, Minors, Concentrations, and other AI programs. Key indicates colors.

AI Careers

AI Degrees on the Rise: Inside U.S. universities' programs in artificial intelligence, from majors to minors and in-between

Universities in the U.S. are rapidly rolling out undergraduate majors, minors, and specializations in artificial intelligence to meet the growing demand for AI expertise.

Bar chart shows a sharp rise in code output per person after Claude Code's release, reaching 8x by 2026.

Machine Learning Research

RSI Is the New AGI: What Is recursive self-improvement, and why Is everybody talking about it?

The phrase recursive self-improvement erupted on social media following an Anthropic report that tracked AI-driven gains in the company’s internal software-engineering productivity.

The chart compares AI benchmark efforts with employment and capital in U.S. job sectors, highlighting discrepancies.

Machine Learning Research

Toward Agent Benchmarks That Reflect Human Work: AI agents may not be getting better at full range of economically valuable labor

AI agents seem to be increasingly capable of performing economically valuable tasks, but current benchmarks measure this capability only narrowly.

Chart shows percentages of U.S. employees using AI, with total users reaching 50% by 2026.

AI Careers

AI at Work, Quantified: Gallup poll shows AI boosts productivity, but many workers haven't tried it

Half of workers in the United States used AI at work at least a few times last year, a sign of steadily rising AI adoption in U.S. workplaces.

A graph shows assistant behavior shifting between helpful and role-playing, with conversation bubbles.

Machine Learning Research

Assistants That Assist Consistently: Large language models can drift drift from helpful personas to harmful ones, but new research aims to stabilize them

Typically, large language models are trained to act as helpful, harmless, honest assistants. However, during long or emotionally charged conversations, traits can emerge that are less beneficial. Researchers devised a way to steady the assistant personas of LLMs.

Two cheerful robots discuss software predictions beside a large question mark at a tech expo.

Letters

That Feeling Of Job Insecurity (And What You Can Do About It): In times of economic and technological uncertainty, build on things that tend to remain stable. Community and skills are likely to weather shifts in business and society.

I’ve been hearing from people at all levels of seniority about a feeling of job insecurity.

Business

Meta Moves to Buy Agent Tech: Meta strikes a deal to acquire Manus, a Singapore-based agentic AI startup with Chinese origins

A high-profile acquisition could enable Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp to offer built-in agents that do users’ bidding.

Juan M. Lavista Ferres is pictured holding a laptop while students watch a video about AI on a screen, linking education and technology.

AI Careers

Education That Works With — Not Against — AI by Juan M. Lavista Ferres: Juan M. Lavista Ferres, Chief Data Scientist at Microsoft, on assignments that properly test students’ abilities

A little more than three years ago, OpenAI released ChatGPT, and education changed forever. For students, the ability to generate fluent, credible text on demand in seconds is an incredible new tool.

A man in a snowy scene offers an apple to a surprised horse hitched to a sleigh with a woman inside.

AI Careers

Big AI Lures Talent With Huge Pay: Meta’s hiring spree raised compensation for top AI engineers and executives

Leading AI companies fought a ferocious war for talent, luring top talent from competitors with levels of compensation more commonly associated with pro sports.

Hands knit a red sweater with white snowflakes, sitting in a warm room with a crackling fire and snowy view.

Letters

How to Gain New Skills and Sharpen Old Ones: Give yourself a gift this holiday season by taking courses, building projects, and (maybe) reading papers.

Another year of rapid AI advances has created more opportunities than ever for anyone — including those just entering the field — to build software.