Dive Brief:
- Managers and supervisors can benefit from using AI-assisted writing tools for grammar and editing, but they risk losing employee trust if they rely too heavily on AI for messages that require human interaction or subjective input, according to a study published in the International Journal of Business Communication.
- More than 8 in 10 of the 1,100 full-time U.S. professionals surveyed for the study view supervisors who use AI for low-assistance messages as sincere. But only 40% to 52% had the same view of supervisors who use high levels of AI-assisted writing, the results showed.
- While employees consider supervisor use of AI-assisted writing appropriate and professional for informational and routine communication, such as meeting reminders, “relationship-oriented messages requiring empathy, praise, congratulations, motivation or personal feedback are better handled with minimal technological intervention,” the researchers found.
Dive Insight:
For the most part, survey respondents are fine with AI-assisted writing being used as a tool to help refine style and presentation.
For instance, as one early career professional (ages 18-29) noted: “The AI tool writes a message from your prompts. In some cases, a message sender may not have the skills to put together an efficient message the same way the AI tool can.”
Survey respondents generally agreed on one main advantage — AI-assisted writing tools can eliminate unprofessional grammar or editing mistakes, which undermine a supervisor’s or manager’s credibility and trustworthiness, according to the study’s co-authors Anthony Coman, a researcher at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business, and Peter Cardon of the University of Southern California.
The authors pointed to previous studies showing that writing errors are associated with lower competency and directly reduce trust in the sender.
However, supervisors who ignore human input when using AI to write relationship-oriented (as opposed to informational) messages may face backlash from their direct reports, the authors cautioned. This is because employees expect these communications to be empathetic, sincere and authentic.
A mid-career professional (ages 30-49) put it this way: “When you are praising the team and then asking them to do even more than they already do, the fact that you could not even be bothered to write the praise/request yourself is a very bad look. It [makes] everything said feel completely disingenuous.”
The warning is timely for supervisors who must notify direct reports about decisions that have a job-changing impact on their employment, now that nearly all managers who use AI tools at work use them to make decisions about raises, promotions, layoffs and terminations, according to a June report from Resume Builder.
Although most of the managers who use AI to help manage their teams expressed confidence in the technology making fair and unbiased decisions, it’s essential not to lose the “people” in people management, Resume Builder Chief Career Advisor Stacie Haller said.
CHROs can make sure their organization’s use of AI tools aligns with human-centric strategies and help foster trust by developing clear communication plans about how the tools impact roles, responsibilities and decision-making, Greg Vert and Laura Shact, human capital AI leaders at Deloitte Consulting suggested in an April op-ed for HR Dive.