AI saving employees almost 4 hours of time in typical workweek, says report
Nearly seven in 10 HR departments across the world are now using artificial intelligence at least once per week, according to a new report.
Findings from Freshworks, which polled 7,000 respondents in seven markets, found that 69% of HR departments are using AI.
They ranked just behind IT (85%) and Marketing (80%) departments when it comes to usage of AI weekly, according to the report.
Source: Freshworks' Global AI Workplace Report
It further found that nearly a third of HR teams (31%) worldwide are using ChatGPT and other generative-AI based search and image creation tools, which have seen growing popularity in the past year.
According to the report, marketing teams have the highest share of ChatGPT users with 41%. They are followed by IT (39%) and sales (34%) teams.
Source: Freshworks' Global AI Workplace Report
AI expertise
The findings are a stronger indication of AI usage among HR teams across the world, in the wake other research previously stressing that they have concerns on reliability and accuracy and low understanding of the technology.
But Freshworks' report revealed that half of HR employees (50%) across the world already consider themselves "knowledgeable or an expert" with AI, according to the report.
Employees from IT are most likely to express confidence in their knowledge and expertise on the tech (75%), according to the report.
Most of marketing (65%), as well as accounting/finance (52%) employees also consider themselves expert or knowledgeable on AI.
Source: Freshworks' Global AI Workplace Report
Benefits of AI
The widespread usage of AI comes as employees report "significant productivity gains" from the tech at work.
AI is already saving employees three hours and 47 minutes in a typical workweek, according to the survey, with the tool mostly used on summarising reports, suggesting next steps, handling repetitive tasks, among others.
Prakash Ramamurthy, chief product officer at Freshworks, said the report demonstrates the "tremendous productivity gains" of AI at an enterprise level
"Knowledge workers are also seeing strong productivity gains at work, which in turn is sparking strong employee interest in mastering AI skills," Ramamurthy said in a statement. "Make no mistake, the AI era is firmly delivering on its promise to free up employees for higher-level work and showcasing compelling returns on AI."