AI job fears—how employers can ease workplace anxiety and embrace innovation

AI has a PR problem that extends to the workplace, where distrust is high. But even as teams experience AI anxiety, many are experimenting with it, especially as generative AI makes the technology more widespread and accessible. In fact, the rise of AI is a tremendous opportunity for employers to alleviate workplace anxiety, empower early adopters and improve their employer brand through the creation of better employee experiences.

According to Gartner, employers can ease anxiety by articulating a vision for how AI will make their lives better. This is crucial because businesses risk their employees becoming stagnant and the company falling behind if they fail to embrace AI. Conversely, employers risk losing early adopters to competitors who demonstrate a clear understanding of AI’s potential and how they will harness it.

How can businesses build a better employer brand with AI? By transforming employee perceptions of AI—in turn, equipping their organizations with AI through a stronger, more adaptable team. Designing a better employee experience with AI is essential to connect vision with a compelling employer brand. By doing so, leaders can change how employees perceive and interact with their organizations and ecosystem of colleagues, customers and clients. Here are three strategies:

Read the pulse of your team

Surveying employees is essential to maintaining the authenticity of any employer, and AI is no exception.

Each employer’s AI journey is unique, and workplace cultures vary greatly. Before articulating a vision for the future of AI in their organizations, employers must first engage with their team to understand their perspectives. This involves asking two sets of questions:

• How do employees feel about AI? Who is apprehensive? Who is adopting it, and how? This inquiry will help identify opportunities to build trust with AI among skeptics and provide support and guidance for early adopters, particularly with generative AI where legal and ethical considerations apply.

• Given that the employee experience is the heart of the employee brand, it is important to assess how employees perceive their experience—including benefits and development. What is the company doing well, and where can it improve?

This approach helps identify the intersection of AI implementation and the employee experience, ranging from learning and development to supporting mental health and wellness.

In addition to surveying the workplace, employers should conduct an audit of AI adoption at an organizational level, such as in human resources and marketing. This process can reveal successful implementation across different teams, enhancing workflows and quality. Equipped with this knowledge, employers can effectively convey the benefits of AI to their teams and demonstrate how its adoption aligns with broader organizational goals.

Articulate a vision for adopting AI

Developing a vision grounded in research serves two vital purposes for the employer brand:

• It persuades both early adopters of AI and employees as a whole that the company has a compelling growth strategy for using AI, which will build trust in the employer brand.

• It identifies how AI can support the employee experience and therefore the employer brand based on employee feedback.

Here is an example of how a company might show employees how AI can support the employee experience: chatbots to support employee wellbeing are becoming increasingly common. With mental health challenges on the rise, employers are turning to digital solutions. According to a recent survey by WTW, approximately one-third of U.S. employers offer digital therapeutics for mental health support, with an additional 15 percent exploring options for implementation by 2025.

Additionally, chatbots can assist employees in handling routine yet important tasks such as answering common questions about benefits (“How many days of PTO do I have left?”). Now, chatbots can act as a primary resource for these queries, relieving HR teams of this responsibility.

Employers must demonstrate how AI-powered chatbots align with their vision and reinforce the tone and culture of their brand rather than employees perceiving chatbots as a one-off gimmick. Communicating this connection strengthens employee trust in both AI and the employer.

Test and adjust

Sustaining an AI strategy goes beyond once-a-year planning—it is an ongoing process. The rapid pace of AI development requires flexibility and agility. This underscores the importance of employers continuously monitoring employee sentiment and adjusting their approach accordingly. Employers are increasingly turning to AI-powered survey instruments to track employee feedback iteratively and make informed decisions.

Employers also must connect the application of AI to measurable outcomes such as improvements in retention and employee sentiment, which employers typically measure comprehensively.

While the CEO holds ultimate accountability, it is becoming common for organizations to designate a chief AI officer. However, shaping a corporation’s AI vision is too critical a task for one person. A collaborative effort from the entire leadership team is needed, including marketing and HR teams to tie initiatives to the employer brand and communicate those efforts across the organization. With effective coordination and commitment, leaders can guide their company through one of its most impactful journeys yet.

Featured in AdAge