The Fine Print of AI Engagement
A new study shows AI can improve employee engagement by a stunning 70 percent—but only if done well. Is that a big ‘if?’
James has a new assistant who handles his calendaring and most emailing, as well as his accounting duties. Sometimes the assistant orders lunch for him. He is thrilled. Of course, this new assistant is an AI agent. James named his agent Memo.
It’s counterintuitive, but this newfound happiness at work is not dependent on agents, but on how the company handles implementation of it. Is there a plan? Is his manager supportive? Are agents used frequently on his team? These are the main variables in successful AI implementation, according to new data from Gallup. When done right, AI implementation can boost engagement by a staggering 22 percentage points—huge numbers at a time when only 19% of the global workforce is engaged in their jobs, a post-pandemic low. But simply offering AI with no support mildly lowers engagement. For managers, AI is becoming a double-edged sword. “The real risk is that their team gets left behind,” says Shanda Mints, Korn Ferry’s vice president of AI strategy and transformation. “Managers themselves have to also go through an AI-transformation.”
To be sure, it’s welcome news that a well-planned AI implementation can increase employee engagement by 70%. In the US, only 31% of employees are engaged.
But the question is whether companies will provide the needed resources and support to implement AI well. “The thinning out of manager ranks certainly puts that engagement in some jeopardy,” says Bryan Ackerman, a senior client partner and Korn Ferry’s head of AI strategy and transformation.
Many leaders assumed that AI would absorb substantial portions of employees’ jobs, freeing them to accomplish more. But while some employees are simply adopting AI as a partner, others are seeing their entire job descriptions scrambled. This means that at the managerial level, the role of overseeing others has fundamentally changed. Managers not only need to hire and train people with the right skills for the new roles, but also coach those that remain on their new jobs—all while swiftly upskilling themselves, to stay two steps ahead of their teams. “This is a huge burden for managers—they’re more exhausted than ever,” says Mints.
Firms short on managerial bandwidth can work to provide AI-implementation support from other parts of the company, says Mark Royal, an employee engagement expert and Korn Ferry senior client partner. Clear communication from the C-suite around AI implementation can help. So can training and guidance from people other than direct managers, Royal says.
More broadly, Royal encourages leaders to look at AI not as a magic bullet, but as an opportunity to reinforce the conditions that consistently drive engagement. “Engagement is about the future," he says. Employees want to know what their careers might look like at the company. Smartly-implemented AI can show that the firm is tech-forward and committed to a program where AI is a partner, not a replacement. “It’s painting a picture of what their future work lives might look like,” he says. “There’s a lot of potential here, but it’s all about how it’s implemented.”
Learn more about Korn Ferry’s AI in the Workplace capabilities.
