Career Explorer Office and admin
Changing shape
Switchboard operators, including answering service
Operate telephone business systems equipment or switchboards to relay incoming, outgoing, and interoffice calls. May supply information to callers and record messages.
Among the careers AI is changing fastest: more resilient than 1% of the 831 careers we score. AI exposure is very high (the Bureau of Labor Statistics rates it very high), and US jobs are projected to change by -26.0% by 2035, expected to shrink.
AI can do many of the tasks, and hiring is expected to grow slower than average or to shrink. The job is likely to change, so build the human parts of it.
- Median pay (2025)
- $38,630
- Job growth to 2035
- -26.0%
- Openings a year
- 3,100
- People doing it (2025)
- 35,400
- Usual route in
- High school diploma, then short on-the-job training
Where people already use AI for this work
- Operate communications equipment or systems
- Provide information to guests, clients, or customers
- Provide general assistance to others, such as customers, patrons, or motorists
From Microsoft Research, Working with AI (2025).
Work AI rarely helps with
- Monitor safety or security of work areas, facilities, or properties
- Operate audiovisual or related equipment
- Reconcile financial data
What the work looks like
- Operate communication systems, such as telephone, switchboard, intercom, two-way radio, or public address.
- Answer incoming calls, greeting callers, providing information, transferring calls or taking messages as necessary.
- Greet visitors, log them in and out of the facility, assign them security badges, and contact employee escorts.
- Monitor alarm systems to ensure that secure conditions are maintained.
- Contact security staff members when necessary, using radio-telephones.
From O*NET 31.0, US Department of Labor.
What the Bureau of Labor Statistics expects
- Fewer of these jobs, as companies continue to use automated phone systems.
Careers using similar strengths, with a stronger outlook
- Insurance claims and policy processing clerksChanging shape, Index 2, -1.9%
- Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerksChanging shape, Index 2, -5.6%
- Gambling and sports book writers and runnersChanging shape, Index 26, +1.8%
- Billing and posting clerksChanging shape, Index 3, -0.1%
Also known as: CBX Operator (Computerized Branch Exchange Operator), Communications Specialist, PBX Operator (Private Branch Exchange Operator), Switchboard Operator (SB Operator), Central Communications Specialist, Communications Operator, Information Specialist, Switchboard Receptionist (SB Receptionist).
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Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections 2025 to 2035; O*NET 31.0; Microsoft Research (2025); Anthropic Economic Index (2026); Eloundou and colleagues (Science, 2024); Felten, Raj and Seamans (2023). How we score. Updated 12 October 2026.