Instead of a typical message of inspiration, Thasunda Brown Duckett, CEO of TIAA, offered Florida A&M University’s class of 2026 tangible ways to approach today’s job market, which is increasingly challenging for Gen Z.
While she acknowledged the growing power of AI can feel intimidating, Duckett, one of only four Black women to ever helm a Fortune 500 company, told graduates on May 1 at Florida A&M University’s commencement that fear isn’t the right response to today’s labor market.
“The world you’re entering won’t stand still,” she said. “ Artificial intelligence is reshaping industries at a pace that is breathtaking. The worldwide economic landscape is shifting right in front of us. Institutions that once felt permanent are being challenged and reimagined. Industries, vocations, and jobs that once seemed reliable may not be the havens they once were.”
The class of 2026 is joining a shrinking labor market. Entry-level job postings made up just 38.6% of all postings in March, down from 44% in 2023, according to ZipRecruiter’s annual Graduate Report published in April. In turn, job seekers are increasingly competing for the entry-level job postings that do exist, with the year-over-year percent change in clicks per job posting jumping from 10% to 21.7%.
Goldman Sachs economists also estimate that AI is now cutting roughly 16,000 U.S. jobs a month, and Gen Z is getting hit the hardest because they’re concentrated in the kinds of routine white-collar roles AI automates first. And in 2025, the share of unemployed Americans who are new workforce entrants hit a 37-year high, peaking at 13.3% in July.
“But I don’t want you to fear these changes,” Duckett insisted, “because it is not all bad news.”
Against the concerning labor market statistics and conditions, Duckett, who runs the $47 billion retirement services giant, offered recent graduates three concrete pieces of advice instead of the usual commencement speech platitudes.
Keep learning, because the half-life of a skill is shrinking
While graduating from college is undoubtedly a massive accomplishment, Duckett encouraged Gen Z to continue learning because what they walk away with won’t carry them through the remainder of their careers.
“Your competitive advantage isn’t what you know today,” she said. “It’s your ability to keep learning, your ability to adapt and to lead through uncertainty.”
That’s because the “shelf life” of skills has “never been shorter,” she said, due to the increasing changes brought forth by AI.
“But the value of judgment, of integrity, of the ability to bring people together around a hard problem, has never been higher,” she added.
Her advice aligns with that of other executives, such as LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, who said graduates need to think beyond their degrees.
“What you should take forward from your college degree isn’t necessarily the thing you learned in X-101,” Hoffman said in a 2025 video on his YouTube channel. “It isn’t specific degrees, specific courses, [or] even necessarily specific skills that are relevant to you.”
“It’s your capacity to say, ‘Hey, here is the new tool set, here’s the new challenge.’ That is actually what the future work’s going to look like,” he added. “One thing is to not focus on the degree, but to focus on how you learn and to be continually learning.”
Lean in rather than shrink back
Duckett’s second rule came from her own career. As the first woman CEO in TIAA’s more than 100-year history, she said she has often walked into rooms where she didn’t see anyone who looked like her and had to decide what to do about it.
“I could spend my energy trying to make myself smaller, less visible, less different, or I could decide that my presence itself was a form of progress, and then go to work to make that true,” she said. “I chose the latter.”
While that choice “was not always comfortable,” she said, “it’s always worth it.”
She urged graduates to do the same: “That choice to show up fully, to lean in rather than shrink back, is one I hope that you carry, because the world you’re stepping into is going to ask that of you, and it’s going to ask that often.”
Build a bigger table
Duckett’s third and final rule was about how to spread the benefits of their success.
She told graduates their degree was more than just a credential: It’s a platform.
“You can hoard success, or you can extend it,” she said. “You can protect your seat at the table, or you can build a bigger table. You can treat your success as a destination, or you can treat it as a beginning.”
She framed that choice in the context of FAMU’s history as a historically Black university founded in 1887, calling the HBCU tradition “one of the most powerful models of collective advancement in American history.”
“Success that stops with you is incomplete,” Duckett said. “Your success isn’t yours alone to keep.”
