After 4,000 Layoffs at Block, Jack Dorsey Says AI Should Replace Middle Managers at Every Company
Weeks after eliminating nearly 40 percent of Block’s workforce, co-founder Jack Dorsey has made his position clear: middle managers are a relic, and artificial intelligence should replace them entirely.
In a recent blog post, the Twitter co-founder argues that companies have long depended on layers of management simply to move information up and down the chain. With AI now capable of handling that coordination at scale and in real time, he believes that human intermediary layer is no longer necessary.
Dorsey’s argument centers on what he describes as a continuously updated model of an entire business a system that can track progress, understand workflows, and align teams without a single manager relaying instructions. Previously, he contends, this required humans. Now, it doesn’t.
He proposes replacing the traditional management pyramid with three types of contributors: individual contributors who build systems, directly responsible individuals who own specific outcomes, and player-coaches who both execute and mentor. AI, in his framework, handles the coordination layer that managers once occupied.
Dorsey isn’t treating this as theory. Earlier this year, Block parent company of Cash App and Square announced roughly 4,000 layoffs as part of a deliberate restructuring around AI capabilities. The company processes millions of transactions daily, giving it access to what Dorsey calls an “economic graph” real-time data on consumer and merchant behaviour that feeds into AI models designed to make business coordination faster and more precise.
The implication is straightforward: as AI systems grow capable of maintaining real-time organisational awareness, the case for a permanent middle management tier weakens considerably.