It may be a huge budget line, but companies can’t seem to get enough of AI and all that it offers. In short order, they are weaving the technology into everything from customer service and software development to marketing and human resources. For leaders, AI has clearly become a competitive necessity. But there’s just one group that doesn’t seem quite as enthusiastic about AI: the employees expected to use it.
Resistance to AI in the workplace appears to be growing. In some cases, that resistance may be showing up as subtle acts of sabotage. A recent survey found that 29 percent of employees—including 44 percent of Gen Z workers—admitted to pushing back against workplace AI efforts, whether by refusing to use AI tools or by entering sensitive company information into public AI systems in violation of company policy. Employee excitement for AI also remains low, with only 16 percent of workers strongly agreeing in one poll that the AI tools were actually useful in their day-to-day work.
The biggest issue is that too many workers feel that, far from helping them, the technology will ultimately replace them. “Organizations that don’t communicate the impact of AI on workers are asking employees to take a leap of faith,” says Bryan Ackermann, head of AI strategy and transformation for Korn Ferry. Indeed, as Tamilla Triantoro, a professor at Quinnipiac University who studies AI in the workplace, puts it, “People don’t operate well under uncertainty, especially uncertainty that affects their economic well-being.” Based on what they hear leaders say, many see AI as their major workplace competitor.
"Leaders can’t overstress how much AI can be a partner for human work and not replace most of it."
To some degree, company leaders only have themselves to blame. According to a press account, one call-center worker helped integrate AI into his workplace only to be fired; in describing that experience, he said, “I was literally digging my own grave.” At the same time, companies continue to ramp up spending on the technology. One recent study projects that global corporate spending on AI solutions will reach $632 billion by 2028. The gap between company enthusiasm and employee anxiety may help explain why some workers remain reluctant to embrace the technology.
Experts say organizations can address the problem by focusing as much on the human side of AI adoption as on the technology itself. Triantoro argues that companies should be transparent about how productivity gains from AI will be used and should identify where people still bring unique value. “At this time, for many tasks, human-AI collaboration works better than AI alone or a human alone,” she says. Employees, she adds, can have valuable input in the decision-making around “where automation is important, where human work is important, and where a combination of both would be best.”
Leaders should also pay closer attention to employees’ emotional reactions to AI, Triantoro says, because anxiety and distrust can undermine adoption efforts. “It’s always up to us to decide how we organize our workplaces,” she says. “With this technology, organizations should think carefully about how to integrate it for the long term, instead of chasing every shiny AI object simply because it’s new.”
