Employees in Australia show mixed trust in workplace AI
- Josephine Tan
Less than half of Australians (40%) are comfortable with the use of AI at work and only a minority believe the benefits of AI outweigh the risks. In particular, only 39% of older generation Australians trust AI at work, compared to 65% of Gen X and millennials.
This is despite the fact that compared to 2020, more Australians have heard of AI and learnt to trust and use tools such as ChatGPT, reported a study conducted by the University of Queensland and KPMG Australia.
Professor Nicole Gillespie, KPMG Chair for Organisational Trust at The University of Queensland School of Business said, “Most people are comfortable with AI use for the purpose of augmenting employee performance and decision-making, for example by providing feedback on how to improve performance and providing input for making decisions.”
“However, people are notably less comfortable with AI use for HR management, such as to monitor and evaluate employees, collect employee performance data, and support recruitment and selection processes.”
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For AI to gain more trust in workplaces across Australia, more safeguards and legislation need to be put in place, with only 35% of Australians believing there are enough safeguards and current laws or regulations to monitor the safe usage of AI across a variety of sectors.
