---
id: "action-preserve-productive-struggle"
type: "action-item"
source_timestamps: ["§ How to Redesign Entry-Level Jobs", "¶19", "¶20"]
tags: ["resilience-building", "talent-development"]
related: ["concept-intelligent-failures", "contrarian-value-of-friction"]
action: "Maintain safe spaces in entry-level roles for juniors to experience pressure, ambiguity, and intelligent failure."
outcome: "Future leaders develop the resilience, grit, and adaptive confidence required for high-stakes roles."
speakers: ["Amy C. Edmondson", "Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic"]
sources: ["reskilling"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-reskilling"
originDay: 10
articleStem: "hbr-edu-46-perils-replace-entry-level"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2025/09/the-perils-of-using-ai-to-replace-entry-level-jobs"
sourceTitle: "The Perils of Using AI to Replace Entry-Level Jobs"
---
# Preserve Productive Struggle and Intelligent Failure

**Action:** Resist the urge to use AI to remove every obstacle from entry-level work. Ensure early-career roles still expose professionals to pressure, ambiguity, and the opportunity for [[concept-intelligent-failures]]. Maintain these roles as safe spaces where the stakes are lower than at the top, letting juniors try, fail, and try again.

**Outcome:** Future leaders develop the resilience, grit, clinical intuition, and empathy under stress required for high-stakes roles. This is step #4 ('develop people') of [[framework-redesign-entry-level]] and the practical form of [[contrarian-value-of-friction]].

**Design refinement (enrichment):** distinguish *low-value* friction (busywork, manual formatting) from *high-value* friction (real responsibility, uncertainty, feedback). The goal is to remove the former while deliberately preserving — or adding, via complex projects, simulations, and red-teaming — the latter.