You just landed your first real job. Six months in, you’re fast, efficient, and producing work that would have taken a senior colleague three times as long five years ago. You’re hitting every deadline. Your manager seems pleased. And yet something feels off, and you can’t quite name why. Millions of early-career professionals feel exactly the same way. And the source of that unease is sitting open in another tab: the tools that are supposedly making you more productive. Psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan spent decades studying what humans actually need to thrive at work. Their answer: three things. Competence, the feeling that you’re genuinely capable and growing. Relatedness, the sense that you belong and matter to the people around you.

Full opinion : AI is quietly eroding competence, connection, and autonomy for early-career workers, and most organizations haven’t noticed yet.