[oneplane]

The 'field' is rather big, and as with most tech fields, 80% of the work is the same (sometimes mundane) stuff. Infrastructure, CRUD, business logic, the whole 12-factor thing.

Where it would start to get tricky is if you have to do more than 'consume' ML libraries. Everyone can learn how to use a library or API, and getting some training going isn't all that hard either. But if you have to build said library, or come up with a new modelling method, that's where it's a real transition and gets really hard to simply 'switch'. It's also one of those areas where a PhD really helps, not from a "certification-as-entrypass" perspective, but because this gets down to hard science. For most companies, however, that's a point they never reach.