By Preston Fore
Publication Date: 2025-11-12 15:00:00
AI continues to ripple through the corporate world, with bosses eager to boost productivity and workers equally eager for tools that make their jobs easier. But as many AI pilots flop, the demand for employees who can actually apply the technology effectively has never been higher.
That’s why Cisco is leaning on its workforce rather than cutting it. Unlike peers such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Accenture—who have trimmed staff—Cisco is investing in skilling up the employees it already has.
“I don’t want to get rid of a bunch of people right now,” CEO Chuck Robbins said to CNBC in August. “I don’t want to get rid of engineers. I just want our engineers we have today to innovate faster and be more productive.”
In practice, that’s meant in part giving developers access to AI coding assistants like Cursor, Windsurf, and GitHub Copilot. Already, about 70% of the company’s 20,000 developers log in to AI coding tools at least once a month, and nearly a quarter…
