Accenture estimates that U.S. companies will require 1.34 million new jobs (+19%) in their supply chains over the next 10 years. But at the same time, the labor market will only offer 221,000 additional professionals (+3.2%) able to take on these roles. This leaves a gap of over 1.1 million jobs that could go unfilled, according to Accenture’s supply chain workforce report.
“Supply chains in the U.S. are facing a serious labor shortage, which threatens the efforts to reshore supply and production. Companies can tackle this challenge with AI and other technologies, but only if they reshape their workflows and roles within it. While AI takes on more execution, people spend more time on what only humans can do: seeing what’s happening on site, making judgment calls, building trust, and solving customer problems. Training and empowering people for this change needs to be top on the agenda of chief supply chain officers,” says Tracey Countryman, global lead, supply chain and engineering at Accenture.
“Even with AI assistance, companies need people to complete more than half of the routine tasks in their supply chains. When AI automates a task, it results in a new workflow, for example, a professional having to review what the AI produced or handling exceptions the system flags. Most supply chain teams are not staffed or skilled for that today. Organizations who build those capabilities in tandem while deploying the technology are the ones most likely to close this gap and lead in an industry marked by frequent disruptions,” adds Kristine Renker, talent lead, supply chain and engineering at Accenture.
Key takeaways:
· Companies are expected to create more jobs in the supply chain as production gets reshored to the United States.
· Accenture’s researchers simulated how technology and the extent to which companies use it in the supply chain could help close the gap. Across the 331 tasks assessed, every single one is affected by at least one technology.
· In one scenario, the shortfall of 1.1 million jobs by 2035 can turn into a surplus of approximately 360,000. It assumes that 75% of the existing supply chain workforce uses agentic AI, autonomous vehicles, drones and exoskeletons, and 50% of the workforce uses IoT and sensor networks.
· The report states that putting such scenarios into practice requires more than deployment of the technologies. Supply chain leaders also need to redesign roles and develop their workforce to break the connection between volume and labor, the researchers write.
· Technology does not affect all supply chain roles equally. Inspectors and testers, for example, face less role redesign, as core tasks like physical inspection, sensory assessment and hands-on quality checks are mostly technology resistant. But the job will still change: 47% of the tasks of inspectors and testers can be automated and 36% augmented through AI and other technologies. Employers should train people in this role with IoT literacy and AI output review skills.
· Automation-led roles such as production planning and expediting clerks see transactional work absorbed by technology, freeing capacity when roles are redesigned.
· Augmentation-led roles as purchasing managers see their decision scope expand as AI accelerates analysis, while new oversight responsibilities grow alongside.
· Structurally durable roles as industrial production managers see limited change because the work depends on leadership, judgment or physical presence.
· Among the technologies studied, agentic AI has the widest impact. It can automate 30% of tasks and augment a further 51%. Cloud computing (49%), intelligent document processing (38%) and robotic process automation (36%) form the second tier, primarily helping workers do existing and routine tasks faster.
