Most people use AI at work, whether their bosses know it or not. Meanwhile, company leaders are simultaneously looking for non-technical talent with AI skills.
A new joint report from LinkedIn and its parent company Microsoft released on Wednesday revealed the almost contradictory state of AI at work, as employees discretely use AI tools and employers seek candidates with those skills without most investing in training or in-house tools.
The survey received responses from 31,000 people in 31 countries between February and March, based on research Microsoft conducted with its Fortune 500 clients to add an employer dimension to the survey.
Company executives indicated in the survey that they overwhelmingly favored job candidates with AI skills, even non-technical talent who could use generative AI like ChatGPT.
In the report, 66% of executives said they would not hire someone without AI skills, and 71% said they would probably hire a less experienced candidate with AI skills over a more experienced candidate without them.
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Despite employer demand for AI knowledge, lower percentages have provided AI training (39%) or invested in AI tools (45%) to employees.
Regardless of whether employers provide training, more employees than ever have adopted AI tools and are reaping the productivity benefits, even as they fear losing their jobs to the technology.
Three out of four knowledge workers, defined in the study as desk workers, use AI to help get things done at work. The main reason 90% of these respondents reported using AI was to save time.
About half of the group (46%) who use AI recently started using it, within the last six months, and most of them (78%) are using AI tools at work “without guidance or permission from above”.
In small and medium-sized companies, the percentage of workers using this “bring your own AI” approach is even higher: 80% of employees use AI discreetly, without prior permission from higher ups.
The trend applies across generations – 73% of boomers and 85% of Gen Z reported using AI tools not provided by their companies.
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At the same time, about half of employees (45%) said they were worried that AI could replace their jobs.
Companies like the $7 billion buy-now-pay-later Klarna have shown that AI would take over the responsibilities of laid-off workers. Klarna DECLARING in February that its AI chatbot “is doing the equivalent work of 700 full-time (customer service) agents.”
The reason why employees are turning to AI tools, despite fears of being replaced by AI, may be that they are dealing with higher workloads. The majority of those surveyed in the report (68%) stated that they find it difficult to keep up with the amount of work they have to do. Nearly half (46%) report feeling burned out.
“The data is clear: people are overwhelmed with digital debt and under pressure at work – and they're turning to AI for relief,” the report said. “The opportunity for every leader is to channel this momentum into ROI.”