Focus on five critical AI-human tensions to integrate workforce and tech with a winning approach
Across the EY survey, it’s clear that talent and AI advantage employers are making progress by cultivating five strategic people capabilities to achieve superior business and talent outcomes.
In Canada and globally, these organizations proactively:
1. Address the learning-retention dilemma
EY research shows: The 81-plus hours of AI training that drives adoption excellence also makes employees 55% more likely to leave. Employees with fewer than four hours of AI learning express a 21% intent to quit; that rises to 45% for those with 81 or more hours. The motivations of highly trained employees shift, too. Those with more than 40 hours prioritize opportunities to work with the latest technology and enhanced flexibility over traditional compensation and career advancement.
Leadership dilemma: How can we balance training for greater AI adoption and higher turnover risk?
Potential actions:
- Target and customize retention tactics.
- Redesign work to move from AI training to AI enablement.
- Refresh career paths with AI in mind.
- Enhance total employee experience to support retention.
2. Capitalize on AI-enabled time gains
EY research shows: AI delivers tangible time savings, with employees reporting an average of eight hours saved per week. However, 64% of employees report an increased individual workload over the past 12 months. While AI is helping save time on existing work, it could also be introducing additional effort.
Leadership dilemma: How can we improve workforce productivity while effectively deploying AI?
Potential actions:
- Redevelop jobs, not just tasks.
- Enforce a “substitution rule” instead of an “addition rule.”
- Control demand creation.
- Shift the emphasis from output volume to decision value.
- Aim to reduce cognitive load instead of time on a given task.
- Protect time gains explicitly.
3. Deal directly with the anxiety-innovation gap
EY research shows: While 72% of organizations have found AI has enhanced innovation, this may also cause anxiety in the workforce: some 38% of employees fear job loss due to AI. The same proportion, 38%, worry about overreliance on AI, eroding human skills, expertise and learning. This fear coexists with innovation demands.
Leadership dilemma: How can we optimize the innovation agenda with AI while managing the level of anxiety it’s creating among our people?
Potential actions:
- Anchor AI innovation to clear human value propositions.
- Separate “AI for efficiency” from “AI for innovation.”
- Make the evolution of skills visible and human led.
- Create AI-enabled roles before old jobs disappear.
- Involve employees in AI design and guardrails.
- Prioritize AI anxiety as a leadership capability instead of an HR issue.
4. Resolve the shadow AI challenge
EY research shows: People are excited about using AI, with 23% to 58% of employees bringing personal AI tools to work; some even pay for their own subscriptions. But using non-company approved AI, sometimes called “shadow AI,” can introduce risks to safety, security and oversight risks for employees and employers alike.
Leadership dilemma: How can we manage and mitigate these risks without dampening the workforce’s interest in AI?
Potential actions:
- Embrace a sanctioned choice architecture that makes people part of the process.
- Provide secure internal AI workspaces or “sandboxes” that encourage safe experimentation.
- Shift oversight from policing to observability.
- Require human accountability for AI‑influenced outcomes.
- Upskill employees in safe and responsible AI use.
- Help people understand the difference between personal productivity risk and enterprise risk.
5. Energize reorganization to combat change fatigue
EY research shows: Roughly 8 out of 10 talent advantage employers have already significantly reorganized due to AI, yet 74% recognize they still need to evolve. With change happening so quickly, employees will feel more and more pressure navigating this environment.
Leadership dilemma: How can we stay at the fore in this changing world while making sure our employees don’t suffer from change fatigue?
Potential actions:
- Acknowledge change fatigue as a leadership reality.
- Replace the idea of transformation with a philosophy based on continuous adoption.
- Separate direction stability from execution flexibility.
- Design roles so they are meant to evolve over time, in line with broader shifts.
- Empower employees to adapt effectively.
- Embrace sustainability metrics to guide progress and inform decisions.
- Treat adaptability as a collective capability.
