Azeem Azhar

What was really going on?

And what does AI exposure mean?

I mean, who's got an AI exposed job?

Does a graphic designer have an AI exposed job?

Does a paralegal have an AI exposed job?

What is the measure by which you assess AI exposure and how do you control for factors?

as relating to the industry or the sub-industry or the firm itself?

We have this ad that goes out around Christmas, which is a dog is for life and not just for Christmas because lots of kids get bought puppies and they have to keep them for a long time, right?

So a young grad hire is for three years, not just for three weeks.

And your argument here is that even if AI can't do

What people say it might be able to do, the fact that the managers believe it might be able to do that has them looking at these long, long-term decisions, which is hiring a person, making a commitment to them, being willing to work with them for two, three, four years.

They're putting that off.

And this actually, Ben, is super fascinating.

Because a mismatch between expectations and reality can be thought of as exuberance.

And it's that mismatch when we think of stock markets and the stock prices is the exuberance that leads to bubbles.

It leads to the idea of ultimately disappointment and the wrong allocation of capital and resources.

So what I'm hearing from you and sort of drawing a thread out is

If there are these expectations about what AI can do, encouraging companies to take decisions about 2027 and 2028, which is what the hiring of a grad in Q4 2025 is actually about, and those expectations are not met, that is actually a kind of a fundamental problem, not just for the graduate, but actually also for the company.

How do we test and identify that it really is the expectation mismatch hypothesis that you've laid out here?

By that, you mean that I'm a large company, I'm hiring, and I say, must have...