By design, most of the workforce now uses AI at work to some extent. Those who don’t may have to start soon or risk losing their current source of employment. The rules around AI use are still evolving from moment to moment, making it doubly hard for workers to keep up with how best to approach the technology. One day, tokenmaxxing is in, urging workers to go all out with their AI usage to show that they know their way around it. The next day, tokenmaxxing is no longer the goal, with employers setting checks in place to limit their reliance on the technology.
Employers want industry experts to lead their operations, spending thousands of dollars to hire the perfect candidate. Soon after, they find the very same workers overqualified and out of budget, forced to lay them off and replace them with AI agents built to replicate them. Some employers eventually find themselves rehiring those they let go too hastily, but this isn’t enough to dissuade them from further investing in this hybrid form of intelligence. The use of AI at work is a non-negotiable factor for a considerable number of employers, but many are failing to build rules and guidelines around its use that could help ensure consistent, high-quality results each time.
Employees are increasingly being advised to use AI at work, but are employers sufficiently prepared for the potential drawbacks? (Image: Freepik)
From Unutilized Productivity to a Rising Risk of Quality Decline: Exploring the Consequences of Excessive AI Use at Work
The rules on AI use at work continue to fluctuate as employers try to find the best way to capitalize on it without overspending on its capabilities. While they embark on a journey to find the balance, the workforce remains unsure of the expectations that have been set and how best to approach the unproven technology. Employees are indeed saving time by using AI in their work, but in many cases, there has been no guidance from employers on what to do with the saved time. Glean found that workers now burn an average of 6.4 hours a week just botsitting, with 69% even “botshitting” at work, letting sloppy AI work pass their desks without review.
Without a complete understanding of the material that is being generated or checks on the accuracy of it, employers open themselves up to considerable backlash and legal trouble when the data is put into use. This laid-back use of AI at work isn’t just a risk to quality and reputation either. Data shows that employee skills could atrophy in time, when they no longer practice them and create anything independently, relying on the tech to perform their roles while they sit back and supervise. This cognitive decline is a very real threat to their well-being and the workplace at large.
If AI Is Our Second Brain, What Are We Doing to Develop the First? AI Introduces a Serious Risk of Cognitive Decline
A blog post by Ryan Donovan at Stack Overflow explores this phenomenon in perfect detail, asserting that AI is slowly becoming our second brain, all at the cost of the first one we have at our disposal. We have all seen reports of AI psychosis leading individuals towards making very dangerous decisions, many not only offloading their knowledge acquisition process to AI, but also their capabilities to make reasonable judgments as well. This isn’t just an individual problem but one that employers need to contend with seriously, particularly due to their role in convincing their workforce to become reliant on AI.
When artificial intelligence becomes the workplace mainstay without safeguards, employers can no longer criticize their workforce for becoming complacent and allowing AI workslop to infiltrate critical reports. Employees are already starting to build connections with AI over their colleagues thanks to their increased interactions with the tools they see as less judgmental. We could soon have workplaces where individuals can only operate individually, sequestered at their desk with AI for company, as they shun other connections due to their reliance on the technology as a one-stop shop for all their needs.
This may be a far-fetched scenario, but it may also be an inevitability. Teenagers and young adults exposed to the tech are already using AI to complete assignments and get through their coursework. On one hand, some may see this as exactly what employers need: new grads who are familiar with the intricacies of artificial intelligence. On the other hand, many of these students are at risk of compromising their own cognitive development, reasoning abilities, critical thinking, skill-building, and other facets of their identity due to technology that has been marketed as inevitable and critical to their careers.
If AI Productivity Is the Goal, Then Workplace AI Regulation Is Critical
If AI technology is here to stay, employers may need to revisit their overall strategy and approach to it before it unleashes more harm than good on the organization. This does not have to mean a complete retreat from AI if heavy investments have already been made in the technology. Instead, introducing protection against its detrimental effects is key. Emerging research on AI highlights numerous issues with the technology, including proliferating biases, presenting inflated or hallucinated data, and churning out sycophantic responses. Establishing safeguards and safety checks to correct for these issues is non-negotiable.
Organizations also need to be more discerning with their AI strategy, plotting out investments, studying the results, and making adjustments one step at a time. Flooding the organization with AI tools and investments makes it much harder to identify the source of emerging problems. It is in the employer’s best interest to also remember the impact AI can have on individuals. If employees are inclined towards using AI for critical thinking to their own detriment, organizing meetings or events where employees work tech-free to have discussions, generate ideas, and generally work independently of tech can help them retain and train the capabilities that have served them well in their careers thus far.
The use of AI at work isn’t a factor that has to be answered with a yes or no response. Thinking beyond basket terms like AI productivity and AI efficiency to truly understand how to build these qualities into operations can result in a more sustainable system at work, where compromises aren’t the defining features of the organization.
What has been your experience with AI usage at work? Share your thoughts and experiences with us. Subscribe to The HR Digest for more insights on workplace trends, layoffs, and what to expect with the advent of AI.
