# Citizens Financial Group: AI workforce and talent

Source: https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/ai-workforce
Last updated: Oct 31, 2026

*Part of the [Citizens Financial Group AI strategy profile](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens).*

## How is AI changing Citizens Financial Group's workforce?

Citizens is adding AI skills to a workforce whose size has barely moved. It had 17,570 full-time equivalent employees at the end of 2023, 17,287 at the end of 2024 and 17,398 at the end of 2025, and reported 17,380 FTE colleagues as of March 31, 2026. Its 2025 Sustainability & Impact Report says over 90% of colleagues completed core AI training by the end of 2025, that GitHub Copilot and Microsoft Copilot were deployed with hands-on training, and that nearly 10,000 participants completed Citizens Academies experiences in 2025, alongside 323,000 hours of professional skills training. Engineers went first: CIO Michael Ruttledge said in July 2024 that the bank had reskilled about 600 engineers and hired upward of 750 software engineers, and by December 2025 about 800 engineers, half the total, used GitHub Copilot. Tech staff take three-week academies in software, data and AI engineering and IT architecture, and an AI Academy teaches employees Microsoft Copilot. On jobs, Ruttledge said in December 2025 that he does not see software development jobs going away, while some vendor staff and legacy coders have been let go and staff whose quality-control checks are being automated are being redeployed. Citizens has not set a target for AI-driven headcount change. ([Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994424000039/cfg-20231231.htm), [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994425000013/cfg-20241231.htm), [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000028/cfg-20251231.htm), [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf), [Banking Dive](https://www.bankingdive.com/news/citizens-bank-cio-ruttledge-ai-banking-generative-genai/722507/), [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/inside-citizens-plan-to-reimagine-itself-with-ai))

## How has Citizens' headcount changed as it adopted AI?

Full-time equivalent employees from the 10-K human capital section, plus the figure in the 2025 Sustainability & Impact Report.

| As of | Headcount | What the filing adds | Source | Sources |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| December 31, 2023 | 17,570 full-time equivalent employees | Primarily across New England and the Mid-Atlantic | 2023 10-K | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994424000039/cfg-20231231.htm) |
| December 31, 2024 | 17,287 full-time equivalent employees | Same footprint; the 10-K says the bank continues to deploy ML and AI/Gen AI 'to drive value-add impact and improved experiences for our colleagues and customers' | 2024 10-K | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994425000013/cfg-20241231.htm) |
| December 31, 2025 | 17,398 full-time equivalent employees | Human capital strategy 'anchored in a skills-based foundation that drives workforce agility and future readiness' | 2025 10-K | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000028/cfg-20251231.htm) |
| March 31, 2026 | 17,380 full-time-equivalent colleagues | Company snapshot in the 2025 Sustainability & Impact Report | Sustainability report | [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf) |

## How does Citizens train employees for AI?

| Date | Program or step | What was said | Sources |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| October 2023 | Generative AI task force | Included model governance and 'our HR team, our talent development team' alongside data scientists, technology and cybersecurity; a recruiting chatbot was already answering candidates | [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/podcast/citizens-plans-for-using-generative-ai-ethically-beth-johnson) |
| July 26, 2024 | Engineer reskilling | About 600 engineers reskilled over three to four years in cloud, data engineering and genAI; upward of 750 software engineers hired; Copilot to go to about 1,000 engineers after a pilot showed a 20% productivity boost | [Banking Dive](https://www.bankingdive.com/news/citizens-bank-cio-ruttledge-ai-banking-generative-genai/722507/) |
| 2024 | Educational Assistance program | Refocused on certifications and courses in next-gen technology, AI, cybersecurity, data and analytics, innovation and wealth management | [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/cfg-2024-sustainability-impact-report.pdf) |
| March 10, 2025 | CIO record in the 2025 proxy | Ruttledge credited with 'immersive Engineering and Architecture Academies, digital credentialing and building of critical skills for the future such as AI' | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994425000044/cfg-20250307.htm) |
| December 1, 2025 | Academies and the AI Academy | Three-week academies in software engineering, data engineering, AI engineering and IT architecture for tech staff; an AI Academy where employees learn Microsoft Copilot; about 800 engineers on GitHub Copilot | [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/inside-citizens-plan-to-reimagine-itself-with-ai) |
| 2025 year-end | Core AI training | Over 90% of colleagues completed core AI training; GitHub Copilot and Microsoft Copilot deployed 'paired with hands-on training and forums to share best practices' | [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf) |
| 2025 | Training by the numbers | 250 senior managers in leadership development, nearly 10,000 participants across six Citizens Academies, 323,000 hours of professional skills training and 151,000 hours of compliance training | [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf) |
| February 12, 2026 | 2025 10-K | A new learning operating model launched in 2025; 'By leveraging artificial intelligence and advanced learning platforms we are accelerating personalized learning' | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000028/cfg-20251231.htm) |

## What has Citizens said about AI and jobs?

Ruttledge told American Banker in December 2025 that he does not see software development jobs going away: 'Coding is still only a fraction of the overall development cycle', and 'You're still going to need engineers to do that'. The same interview says Citizens has 'released' some employees of vendors such as Infosys, Accenture, IBM and Cognizant, let go some legacy coders who were not ready for agile development, and is redeploying people whose call quality-control reviews generative AI is being piloted to cover for 100% of calls. ([American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/inside-citizens-plan-to-reimagine-itself-with-ai))

Hiring is changing too. The 2025 report says Citizens sharpened how it attracts talent 'in a rapidly changing labor market shaped by artificial intelligence', used AI 'to simplify applications, accelerate scheduling, and reduce the time needed to interview and make hiring decisions', and filled nearly 30% of open roles with current colleagues; the 2024 report put internal hires at more than 30% of open roles. ([Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf), [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/cfg-2024-sustainability-impact-report.pdf))

Oversight sits with the board's Compensation and HR Committee, which 'considers how the latest technology trends impact the modern workforce', per the 2025 and 2026 proxies. Citizens has not disclosed how many roles Reimagine the Bank will change, an AI-related severance charge, or AI-specific training hours per employee; the 2025 report says it does not disclose average training hours per employee by gender and category. ([Citizens Financial Group (SEC filing)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994425000044/cfg-20250307.htm), [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000064/cfg-20260309.htm), [Citizens Financial Group](https://investor.citizensbank.com/~/media/Files/C/CitizensBank-IR/2025-sustainability-impact-report.pdf))

## What does the Citizens profile record on this topic?

| Date | Move | Detail | Sources |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Sep 29, 2026 | Coughlin: engineers now 30-40% more productive with AI | American Banker reports the average Citizens engineer is 30% to 40% more productive than a year earlier under the three-year, $300 million Reimagine the Bank project; Coughlin says the role is evolving toward engineers overseeing multiple AI agents, and that AI-existential-risk warnings have 'not really' changed the project's direction. | [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/tech-leaders-say-ai-could-end-humanity-banks-still-love-it) |
| Jul 16, 2026 | Q2 2026: AI agents in the back office, a 10x engineering pilot | Back-office re-architecture with AI agents orchestrating end-to-end workflows, AI case classification, AI in credit-card contact centres and a first enterprise-wide AI-chat agent; about $7 million of program costs in the quarter. | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000133/a2q26earningspresentatio.htm), [MarketBeat (Yahoo Finance)](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/citizens-financial-group-q2-earnings-150449628.html), [PYMNTS](https://www.pymnts.com/news/banking/2026/citizens-bank-mobilizes-ai-to-target-450-million-operational-savings-by-2028/), [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/citizens-to-exit-in-store-branches-build-standalones-nearby), [Earnings call transcript (The Motley Fool)](https://fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/07/23/citizens-financial-cfg-q2-2026-earnings-call-transcript) |
| Jun 1, 2026 | The mainframe goes: CIO's cloud-first claim | 700 applications migrated; CiZi −44% call volume; +55% output for engineers on advanced agents. | [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/citizen-financials-michael-ruttledge-is-43-on-the-most-innovative-people-in-finance-ranking) |
| Apr 16, 2026 | Q1 2026 call: reimagine programme self-funded by non-AI savings | Coughlin said over $30 million of vendor savings were already projected for 2026 and facility closures offset early investment, and that 25% of calls answered by non-humans should arrive in summer and early autumn; AI coding tests showed 30% productivity gains and in some cases 5x to 10x. | [Earnings call transcript (The Motley Fool)](https://fool.com/earnings/call-transcripts/2026/04/16/citizens-cfg-q1-2026-earnings-call-transcript) |
| Apr 16, 2026 | Q1 2026: LLMs in the call centre, 25% of calls without a human by year-end | About 50% over time; GenAI automating private-company credit research; AI coding pilots showing 30% to 10x productivity gains; $6 million of implementation costs. | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000070/a1q26earningspresentatio.htm), [Yahoo Finance](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/citizens-financial-group-inc-q1-164633929.html) |
| Mar 9, 2026 | Proxy: Board oversees a 'measured approach to AI' | The DEF 14A says the Board ensures a measured approach to AI within a governance structure with guardrails, that AI-related risk is managed under the enterprise risk framework, and that directors received AI and generative AI training in 2025. | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000064/cfg-20260309.htm) |
| Jan 21, 2026 | Q4 2025 deck: ~50 initiatives in five themes | Software productivity with AI, AI fraud detection, an 'AI Powered Banker' and KYC/AML streamlining among them; two-thirds of the benefit from expenses, about 5% of the 2025 expense base; call-centre modernisation and voice AI discussed on the call. | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994426000017/a4q25earningspresentatio.htm), [MarketBeat (Yahoo Finance)](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/citizens-financial-group-q4-earnings-162728449.html) |
| Dec 16, 2025 | The Banker's US Bank of the Year | The award cites AI-driven productivity tools, integrated developer platforms and digital account opening. | [Citizens Financial Group (Business Wire)](https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20251216599841/en/Citizens-Financial-Group-Named-Bank-of-the-Year-by-The-Banker) |
| Nov 20, 2025 | GitHub Copilot's coding agent to ~800 developers | Half the software developers; fintech partners rewriting legacy systems for the cloud. | [American Banker](https://www.americanbanker.com/news/how-citi-citizens-td-deploy-ai-agents-without-upsetting-humans) |
| Oct 15, 2025 | Q3 2025 deck: agentic AI call centre and agentic infrastructure on the Reimagine list | The deck listed an agentic-AI-enabled call centre, building agentic AI infrastructure, AI-driven pricing, credit and collections, AI-driven fraud, KYC and AML tools, and further upskilling of AI/ML talent, with details promised for January. | [Citizens Financial Group (SEC filings)](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/759944/000075994425000139/cfg3q25earningspresentat.htm) |
| Sep 9, 2024 | No in-house LLM: AWS and Microsoft models | Ruttledge said Citizens had no plan to build its own large language models and would use best-in-class models from its providers; gen AI for documentation, code conversion and testing gave a 10% to 20% productivity gain. | [Bank Automation News](https://bankautomationnews.com/banking/citizens-sees-up-to-20-efficiency-gains-through-gen-ai) |
| Jul 26, 2024 | CIO: 90 gen-AI ideas, six pursued, two in production; Copilot pilot lifts productivity 20% | A hackathon produced over 90 ideas. The two live uses were Microsoft Copilot for engineers (pilot showed a 20% productivity boost; rollout to about 1,000 engineers planned) and a gen-AI product assistant for contact-centre staff. A human validates the code and the answers. | [Banking Dive](https://www.bankingdive.com/news/citizens-bank-cio-ruttledge-ai-banking-generative-genai/722507/) |

## Common questions

### How many employees does Citizens have?

Citizens had 17,398 full-time equivalent employees at December 31, 2025, primarily in New England and the Mid-Atlantic, per its 2025 10-K, and 17,380 as of March 31, 2026, per its sustainability report. That compares with 17,570 at the end of 2023 and 17,287 at the end of 2024.

### How does Citizens train employees on AI?

Through core AI training that over 90% of colleagues had completed by the end of 2025, monthly webinars and show-and-tell sessions, an AI Academy for Microsoft Copilot, three-week technical academies for engineers, and formal AI academies and badging programs for deeper expertise, according to the 2025 Sustainability & Impact Report and American Banker.

### Is Citizens cutting jobs because of AI?

It has not announced AI-driven job cuts or a headcount target, and headcount has stayed near 17,400. CIO Michael Ruttledge said in December 2025 that engineers will still be needed, but the bank has released some vendor staff and legacy coders and is redeploying people whose quality-control work AI is being piloted to automate.

### How many Citizens engineers use AI coding tools?

About 800, half of its software engineers, were using GitHub Copilot and some its coding agent by December 2025, per American Banker. In July 2024 the bank planned to roll Copilot out to about 1,000 engineers after a pilot showed a 20% productivity boost; Ruttledge put the later uplift at 10% to 15%.

### Is Citizens hiring for AI?

Yes, in small numbers. BankingNewsAI's weekly read of Citizens' careers site on October 27, 2026 listed a distinguished engineer for non-human and agentic identity, principal data scientists including one in decisioning, a principal security engineer for AI data and browser protection, and a senior data scientist in wealth management. Postings change weekly and are not cited as sources; see /banks/ai-hiring.
## Deeper on Citizens

- [What is Citizens Financial Group's AI strategy?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/ai-strategy)
- [What AI partnerships and patents does Citizens Financial Group have?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/ai-research-patents-partnerships)
- [What is CiZi, and how is Citizens using AI assistants?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/virtual-assistant)
- [What technology stack does Citizens run its AI on?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/technology-stack)
- [What proprietary AI has Citizens built in-house?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/proprietary-ai)
- [How does Citizens Financial Group govern AI and manage AI risk?](https://www.bankingnewsai.com/banks/citizens/responsible-ai)


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