EXCLUSIVE: How employees view AI management tools
Artificial intelligence can streamline managerial tasks, but employees are not necessarily receptive to its usage.
New data exclusively released to Chain Store Age by technology comparison platform Software Finder reveals that one-in-five (21%) employees have had their performance evaluated by AI-based tools by their employer.
However, 23% of 1,000 employees across industries surveyed by Software Finder have felt misjudged by an AI-powered performance tool and 66% trust AI tools less. Only 12% trust this technology more and 22% trust AI about the same as human performance management.
Overall, six-in-10 (59%) respondents feel optimistic about AI's growing role in their workplace. But only one-in-three believe AI improves their ability to succeed at work, 24% believe it threatens it, and 18% think it does both. Eighty-five percent believe a human manager or HR should make the final decision in hiring.
Examining feelings toward workplace AI by generation, the survey finds Gen Z respondents are the most likely to trust AI tools for performance evaluation more than human managers (14%). Interestingly, Gen Z is also the generation least likely to be comfortable with being hired or fired by AI (9%), while millennials are most likely by a close margin (11%).
One-in-four respondents overall believe a combination of AI assessments and human feedback most accurately reflects their value at work, while seven-in-10 believe human feedback alone is the most accurate reflection.
Millennial respondents are the most likely (24%) to believe a combination of AI assessments and human feedback most accurately reflects their value at work (28%).
While 26% of respondents overall believe AI makes learning at work easier and more efficient, 42% feel it makes it more impersonal and robotic, and 32% think it's a combination of both. Gen X respondents are the most likely to feel AI makes learning at work easier and more efficient (28%), and the least likely to feel it makes it more impersonal and robotic (38%).
[READ MORE: Walmart to offer AI-based employee training]
Other findings
- 46% of respondents have used an AI-based training or learning tool at work.
- 55% prefer hybrid training (AI with human support) for workplace learning.
- Among respondents experiencing AI-enabled onboarding, 46% feel less connected to their company as a result, while 43% feel it makes no difference.
- 23% claim their company is not transparent about their AI usage at work, and 34% are unsure of transparency.
- Top roles AI shouldn't fill according to respondents are: firing, disciplinary action, and promotions or career development.
For this study, Software Finder surveyed 1,006 employees about their company and their own AI usage in the workplace.
