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UBS, one of the largest banks in the world, based in Switzerland, announced that starting with its 2027 hiring class, new graduates and interns applying for banking jobs must prove they know how to use AI tools well. Think of it like a driving school suddenly saying, 'You can't just know how to steer a car — you need to show us you can actually drive in traffic before we give you the keys.' Before this, AI skills were a nice bonus. Now they're a required checkbox, just like having a good college degree.
The rule applies to people applying to join UBS's Global Banking and Markets division — basically the deal-making and trading side of the bank — starting with the 2027 intake, which means students who will graduate around then. It covers both full graduate hires and interns. It's a bit like a sports team announcing new tryout rules two years before the next season, giving hopeful players time to prepare and practice the new skill before showtime.
UBS isn't just asking, 'Have you used ChatGPT?' It wants applicants to show they can use AI tools thoughtfully to make real work better — things like research, financial analysis, and building client presentations. Imagine a chef who doesn't just own a fancy oven but actually knows how to use its settings to cook a perfect dish every time, and knows when the oven's temperature reading is wrong. That's the difference between casually using AI and being 'proficient' with it.
Recruitment interviews at UBS will now include specific questions about AI use, on top of the usual questions about grades, work experience, and personality. Candidates still need strong academic records, like a good university degree, but now they'll also be asked to describe real examples of how they've used AI tools to solve a problem or improve their work. It's similar to a job interview for a delivery driver now including a question about whether you know how to use GPS apps efficiently, not just whether you can drive.
Once hired, new recruits don't just get thrown into the deep end. UBS has an internal training program for its graduate hires that teaches real banking-specific AI use cases along with responsible and safe use of the technology. Picture it like a new hire at a hospital getting hands-on training on how to properly use complex medical equipment, instead of just being told to figure it out. This shows UBS expects to keep coaching junior staff even after they clear the hiring bar.
This change didn't happen in a vacuum. For the past couple of years, banks have been using AI to automate a lot of the repetitive grunt work junior bankers used to do, like building spreadsheets or writing first drafts of reports. Some banks, like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan, have actually been shrinking the size of their junior analyst classes because AI can now do some of that work. Morgan Stanley research even suggests that Europe's banking sector could see over 200,000 jobs affected by AI in the coming years. It's like a factory installing new machines and needing fewer workers on the assembly line — except now the workers left need to know how to run the machines.
Not everyone thinks this is purely good news. A senior banker at JPMorgan named Conor Hillery warned that if junior employees lean on AI tools too early in their careers, they might never develop the deep problem-solving instincts that come from struggling through mistakes the old-fashioned way. Researchers have even given this a name: 'never-skilling.' It's a bit like a student who always uses a calculator and never learns to do math by hand — they might get the right answer quickly, but they never build the deeper understanding underneath it.
UBS says this AI requirement will likely spread to other job openings across the bank, not just the original banking and markets roles. Other banks, like Santander, are already doing something similar by seeking 'advanced AI users' for their own graduate programs. This suggests we're watching the early days of a bigger shift across the whole finance industry — where knowing how to work alongside AI becomes as basic a requirement as knowing how to use Excel spreadsheets is today.
UBS made headlines by becoming one of the first big banks to officially require entry-level job candidates to prove they can use AI tools skillfully, not just casually. This move comes at a time when AI is already automating a lot of junior-level banking work, shrinking hiring at some rival banks and reshaping what an entry-level job even looks like. UBS insists it still values traditional skills like strong grades and analytical thinking, and it backs up the requirement with in-house training once people are hired. But critics warn that leaning on AI too early could stop young workers from developing the deeper judgment and problem-solving instincts that used to come from doing the hard work manually. Overall, this story is really about how the entire idea of an 'entry-level job' is being redefined by AI, not just at UBS but across the finance world.
If you were hiring for an entry-level job today, would you rather have someone who's great with AI tools but less experienced with doing the work manually, or someone with strong old-school fundamentals but less comfortable with AI — and why?
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