We are just a few years removed from a time when AI was not yet ingrained in our office lives, but many workers already wish they could go back.
Nearly two-thirds (65%) of 2,500 knowledge workers surveyed by digital consulting group Adaptavist said they often feel “nostalgic” about how work was conducted before the widespread adoption of AI. One in three said AI has already led them to contemplate changing industries (including 46% of C-level executives), and more than a third (34%) said AI has led them to consider an early retirement.
Surprisingly, preference for the pre-AI world was strongest among Gen Z workers, 42% of whom said they preferred pre-AI work life overall.
Yet most of those surveyed also acknowledged AI’s importance. More than two thirds (67%) said they wanted their organization to increase the use of AI, and 69% said they think their organization is using AI ethically.
Why, then, are so many yearning for a bygone era?
While some pre-AI nostalgia may be a reflection of sloppy AI adoption policies – the report describes a “verification tax” created by the need to check, correct, and validate AI-generated work – the root of the phenomenon may be existential.
AI has workers questioning if the “soul of their work has been traded in for the sake of convenience and efficiency,” the authors write, and wondering whether “something human and meaningful is slipping away in the process of leveraging AI at work.”
Almost half (46%) of the surveyed workers expressed frustration that tasks requiring years of expertise can now be done by almost anyone using AI. Nearly a third (31%) said they would prefer an AI-free office because AI reduces human creativity, and another 23% said their personal expertise has been devalued.
These responses are particularly worrisome considering that many workers, particularly younger ones, increasingly see their jobs as lacking purpose and meaning.
The upshot is that organizations must emphasize human ownership of work and ensure that employees feel that their expertise has unique value. This may mean adopting a more targeted use of AI that preserves the importance of human expertise.
“The future of AI in the workplace will be defined not by adoption rates, but by whether organisations can design environments where people remain confident, capable, and in control of their work,” the report states.