Employers expect AI to make their workforce more productive, but many employees are
A new survey of C-suite executives, full-time employees and freelancers from Upwork, a job marketplace, shows that the demands being placed on regular employees are not balanced with the
At the same time, employers overestimate their workforce's ability to use AI: 37% of employers said their people are highly skilled and comfortable with their AI tools, but only 17% of employees feel the same. And the disconnect doesn't stop there: 65% of employees said their employer's demands are overwhelming, almost half say they don't know how to use AI to achieve their employer's goals and 77% said AI has actually added to their workload.
Read more:
To combat this, some employers have brought in freelance AI professionals who can both complete some of the AI-specific tasks needed, as well as teach their skills to full-time employees. Almost half of the freelancers surveyed said they are somewhat or highly skilled in AI.
"[Employees] just can't keep pace — they're burned out, and you're adding something else to their plate," says Kelly Monahan, managing director of the research institute at Upwork. "Freelancers [can] be colleagues and friends who come alongside and really help coach, train and alleviate some of this burden."
The leaders employing this strategy reported meaningful results, saying they had doubled outcomes in areas of organizational agility, the quality of work being produced, innovation, scalability, revenue and efficiency. Eighty percent of those who have utilized freelance talent say it is now an essential part of their business, and another 38% plan to begin utilizing independent AI professionals over the next year. While freelancers help with the more complex AI-based work, regular employees can better balance other responsibilities while learning alongside these skilled professionals, leading to a better overall outcome for the business.
"The two main pathways we're seeing are, [first,] freelancers looking to go in and help build AI models and tools for clients — these are going to be your data scientists, prompt engineers and machine learning engineers who go in and help build the AI you need without bringing in that full-time work," says Monahan. "The second is the builder, or operator side, to come in and consult with the team and figure out, 'Where can we find efficiency? Where can we automate?' It really begins to operate the AI tool within a particular domain or skill set."
Read more:
Whether or not an employer decides to bring in outside AI talent, Monahan notes that there are proactive ways to make sure a workforce is not being bogged down by the technology tools that are supposed to be helping them.
"First, have an AI strategy at the business level," she says. "What is a business problem you're trying to solve? That is missing in the majority of AI roll-out, and it's hard to get motivated to learn a new tool. If you don't bring on freelancers, this requires skills training and really having permission to rethink the way work is done. If applied appropriately, this can be transformative in the majority of functions, yet if we try to pigeonhole it into their existing workflow, it's not going to work well."
If AI is a part of their employees' toolboxes, employers can conduct ongoing skills assessments within their workforce so they know where people are doing well and where they need additional support. Skills assessment vendors are a good way to see where employees are in their knowledge, and can also help companies measure progress and outcomes.
Read more:
Internal assessments can be connected to broader surveys so that leaders get a read on how employees are feeling on this topic, as well as connected issues like professional development, stress and burnout, says Monahan. Bringing new tech tools on board with a clear explanation of their benefits to workers, along with the proper training or assistance, is key to them being impactful.
"I hope the dialogue moves more into, 'How do we create new value, how do we create better customer outcomes, how do we connect more deeply into service and to others through this?'" she says.
