ClaimVideo · 103:54 · 2m
In the age of AI, employee cost should be a dynamic number based on their model usage choices rather than a static salary, creating a new quadrant for evaluating employee cost-effectiveness.
Alex Atallah · 20VC
PredictionVideo · 64:30 — 65:52
In the age of AI, employee costs should become dynamic numbers based on how efficiently workers choose and use AI models, rather than remaining static salaries — and managers should evaluate employees on both productivity and cost-effectiveness.
Alex Atallah proposes that as AI inference becomes a major operational expense, the concept of employee cost should shift from a static salary to a dynamic number reflecting how efficiently each employee uses expensive and cheap models — creating a quadrant of cost-effectiveness and productivity that managers can act on. ✦ AI generated
Alex Atallah · 20VC · 2026-08-10 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 64:30
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“What's the craziest thing that you see in your seat on top of everyone's usage that you don't think people talk about enough?”
Really, your your employees all cost totally dynamic different amounts now and uh I think a lot of like companies are putting it on them to do routing. And I think in the future there's a good chance that it will like get pushed downwards to the employee level. Your employees should like figure out which tools and models to use that are best for their tasks and then we should figure out how much you're costing be like due to the choices that you make as an employee [snorts] and you know, your your cost as an employee is a going to be a dynamic number and it's going to be, you know, dependent on how much that employee is like effectively using, you know, expensive and cheap models to do their job. And uh and then I would I I advise companies to kind of like still do their normal management work, like have their managers kind of assess how how effective and productive employees are, but also line it up with how much their employees cost, and then kind of come up with, you know, a quadrant of of celebration. Like these employees are like doing a good job and they're pretty price effective or cost effective. And then a quadrant of concern, and these employees are kind of maybe doing a so-so job and whoa, they are not cost effective at all.
verbatim transcript · starts at 64:30
Transcript · around this moment
64:16Like someone knows what what everyone's making but like it's a static number that like it's readjusted on on a quarterly basis maybe after performance reviews. Really, your your employees all cost totally dynamic different amounts now and uh I think a lot of like companies are putting it on them to do routing. And I think in the future there's a good chance that it will like get pushed
64:43downwards to the employee level. Your employees should like figure out which tools and models to use that are best for their tasks and then we should figure out how much you're costing be like due to the choices that you make as an employee [snorts] and you know, your your cost as an employee is a going to be a dynamic number and it's going to be, you know, dependent on
65:05how much that employee is like effectively using, you know, expensive and cheap models to do their job. And uh and then I would I I advise companies to kind of like still do their normal management work, like have their managers kind of assess how how effective and productive employees are, but also line it up with how much their employees cost, and then kind of come up with, you know, a quadrant of
65:32of celebration. Like these employees are like doing a good job and they're pretty price effective or cost effective. And then a quadrant of concern, and these employees are kind of maybe doing a so-so job and whoa, they are not cost effective at all. Their AI use their AI psychosis is off the charts. Like and then you address the quadrant of concern. So I don't think people talk
65:52about like basically how you think of like employee cost in the age of AI and that it's it's really it should be a dynamic number and not a a static thing that like only a few people know about and it's gone. >> And wonderful, but can you imagine going to someone, "Oh, I'm sorry, you you were worth 100 grand last month, now you're worth 50." I think it would make
66:12planning >> Well, they they are in control of how much they cost. That's the great thing. Like all employees are in control of how much they cost and and can like influence that. Um it's now now you get to think like, "Okay, how good am I as an employee and how uh efficient am I being as well?" >> Final one, when you look at the landscape today, there are so many
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