Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt worked 60-hour weeks: ‘I used to tell people my job is to sit in meetings 12 hours a day’—he says AI will kill that burden

Eric Schmidt says running Google meant spending most of his time in meetings, not dreaming up the next product launch. The former CEO said he was in the conference room for 12 hours a day, five days a week, with weekends tacked on too. By his estimate, that added up to about 63 hours a week.

Now Schmidt thinks AI can strip out a lot of that work. The 71-year-old argues that business software can take over the “coordination tax” that eats up so much time inside large companies. In his view, AI can move information around, line people up and handle the kind of behind-the-scenes juggling that keeps organizations running.

He says that same shift will also make some jobs vanish. Schmidt pointed to a friend who cut 20% of the workforce and let go of people who handled planning, coordination and internal communication — the “glue people,” as he called them. He went further, saying that in a 10,000-person company, a few thousand employees may no longer be needed.

That’s a blunt forecast, especially coming from someone expected to benefit from the boom. Schmidt has an estimated net worth of $66 billion, and this week it was revealed that he owns roughly a 1% stake in Anthropic. If the company ever goes public at its $2 trillion target, that stake could be worth about $20 billion.

But he isn’t saying humans disappear entirely. Schmidt says companies will still need inventors, salespeople, leaders and people who can work with government. His message to graduates at the University of Arizona was simple: don’t fight the technology, join the people building it. Some booed. He told them to get on the rocket ship anyway.