Researchers Say AI Doesn't Make Work Easier, Just Intensifies It

A report by US academics on artificial intelligence and machine learning has spurred doubts about the benefits of AI.

The report, published in the Harvard Business Review, has created debate on whether signs of burnout are coming from people who embrace AI.

Researchers Aruna Ranganathan and Xingqi Maggie Ye, from the University of California, Berkley, say they did an eight-month study – “in progress research” – of how generative AI changed work habits at a US-based technology company with about 200 employees.

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They found employees worked at a faster pace, but also took on a broader scope of tasks, and extended work into more hours of the day, often without being asked to do that.

They said: “The productivity surge enjoyed at the beginning can give way to lower quality work, turnover, and other problems.”

They feared “workload creep can in turn lead to cognitive fatigue, burnout, and weakened decision-making.”

Companies, they said, “need to develop a set of norms and standards around AI use,” which they called ‘AI practice.’

After a lot of interviews over many months till late last year, they identified three main reasons why employees’ workloads were intensifying:

It expanded the number of tasks they were able to do;
It blurred the boundaries between work and non-work;
And it required more multi-tasking from these employees.

While workers achieved higher productivity in the short term, they also experienced a “silent workload creep and growing cognitive strain as employees juggle multiple AI-enabled workflows.”

That meant negative impacts.

“For workers, the cumulative effect is fatigue, burnout, and a growing sense that work is harder to step away from, especially as organizational expectations for speed and responsiveness rise.”

So, they suggested that employers need to consider ways to help AI workers better manage their new workloads and responsibilities.

“Our findings suggest that without intention, AI makes it easier to do more — but harder to stop.”

Others had similar reactions, according to a report by TechCrunch, which quoted a comment posted on the tech industry forum Hacker News:

It said: “I feel this. Since my team has jumped into an AI everything working style, expectations have tripled, stress has tripled and actual productivity has only gone up by maybe 10%.

“It feels like leadership is putting immense pressure on everyone to prove their investment in AI is worth it and we all feel the pressure to try to show them it is while actually having to work longer hours to do so.”

So, now, perhaps, a deeper grasp of AI impacts – or drawbacks – is starting to emerge.