Salesforce Lays Off 4,000 Customer Support Staff as AI Transforms Operations

Salesforce has cut approximately 4,000 jobs in its customer support division, reducing the workforce from 9,000 employees to about 5,000, marking a 45% reduction. This major downsizing reflects the company's increased reliance on artificial intelligence (AI) in handling customer service operations.

CEO Marc Benioff confirmed these cuts during his appearance on the Logan Bartlett podcast, explaining that AI agents now manage about half of all customer conversations, with human agents handling the rest. He described the recent months as "eight of the most exciting" in his career due to the rapid transformation brought by AI technology.

Benioff also highlighted that AI is being utilized beyond customer support, particularly in sales, where it helps address a backlog of over 100 million uncalled sales leads accumulated over 26 years. Salesforce’s AI system autonomously contacts these leads, significantly increasing engagement capacity.

The company uses an "omnichannel supervisor" platform to coordinate interactions between AI and human agents, allowing AI to handle customer queries and escalate to humans when necessary. Benioff likened this coordination to Tesla’s self-driving cars that switch control between AI and human drivers based on circumstance.

This workforce reduction contrasts with Benioff’s statements earlier in 2025, when he downplayed fears about AI-driven layoffs, maintaining that AI would augment rather than replace employees. However, the current cuts demonstrate that AI deployment in Salesforce has led to a tangible decrease in customer support staffing.

Across its divisions, Salesforce employed over 76,000 people as of January 2025, making the 4,000 support job cuts roughly 5% of its total workforce. The move underscores the growing impact of AI automation in the technology sector, as companies like Salesforce integrate intelligent systems to streamline operations and improve productivity.