[DigitalToday reporter Yoonseo Lee] The spread of artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the hiring landscape in the U.S. tech industry. Companies are not only reshaping existing jobs around AI. They are also creating new roles such as media relations, on-site engineers, in-house philosophers, vibe coders and chief AI officers (CAIO).

Business Insider on May 17 (local time) said the shift is intersecting with a trend of more companies citing AI as they talk about layoffs. Workforce reductions are under way on one side, while aggressive hiring is happening on the other for staff dedicated to adopting and operating generative AI and rolling it out internally.

Job postings are featuring roles that were previously rare, ranging from long-established fields such as philosophy to vibe coding that presumes the use of generative AI tools.

One of the most notable areas is AI communications roles. OpenAI and Anthropic are looking for talent to handle media engagement and expand their ecosystems. Anthropic is hiring a "Claude evangelist" to serve as the face of the company. While the average annual salary for a communications director in the United States is about $106,000, related roles at OpenAI and Anthropic have starting pay above $200,000. The Claude evangelist role starts at $240,000.

Demand is also surging for engineers who are deployed directly to customer sites. Palantir popularised the role in the 2010s. Instead of selling general-purpose software, the model places specialised engineers inside client organisations to provide tailored solutions. Based on Indeed, postings for on-site engineers in January 2026 rose about 19-fold from a year earlier. OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Palantir are among those seeking such staff, and some roles require the ability to travel. Starting pay is generally $115,000 to more than $200,000.

Roles aimed at spreading AI inside companies are also increasing. Stripe is hiring an "on-site AI accelerator" to work within its marketing organisation and help colleagues "build the basics of all work with AI". Box is looking for an "AI business automation engineer" to roll out AI agents across the company. These roles are less about being simple development staff and closer to driving AI performance in line with each team’s goals. Base pay for the Stripe role starts at $132,000, and Box starts at $146,500.

In AI ethics and safety, demand has risen for people who studied philosophy. Anthropic and Google DeepMind each have an in-house philosopher, and both roles are tasked with checking whether AI models operate in line with human values. Anthropic has also released a "Claude Constitution" that sets out a value system its AI should follow. Base pay for AI ethics and safety roles recently hired by DeepMind ranged from $212,000 to $231,000.

Gig-style jobs on short-term contracts or project bases are also increasing. Companies such as Scale AI and Mercor offer human-in-the-loop training tasks including AI model feedback, translation support and evaluating a sense of humour. Traditional platforms such as Uber, DoorDash and Instawork are also offering upload-based tasks involving photos and videos of housework and various jobs. Hourly pay ranges from $15 to $200 depending on the nature of the work and the level of skill required.

New roles tied to "vibe coding" have also been created as AI coding tools spread. Lovable is hiring specialist vibe coders, and TikTok is looking for product designers who can build prototypes using code and AI tools. YouTube wants AI solution architects who can use AI-assisted development and low-code tools. Starting pay is $108,000 at TikTok and $149,000 at YouTube.

Executive titles are also being reshaped. PwC appointed a CAIO in 2024, and Accenture named its first CAIO that year as well. Investment bank Raymond James created a chief AI architect position in 2025. Local governments in the United States have also moved to hire CAIOs. Glassdoor estimates related compensation at $265,000 to $494,000.

AI hiring is spreading across the board, from supporting external customer deployments and shifting internal work to securing model safety, training data, changing development methods and reshaping management roles. Job postings show companies see AI not as a simple tool but as a catalyst for redesigning organisational structures.