Published on: May 28, 2025 at 5:25 pm
More than one in four workers are worried that AI will lead to job losses, according to a recent poll from the conciliation service Acas. Currently, leaders and management have a key role in shaping how employees use AI during this technological transition.
Instead of viewing AI as a potential replacement for human workers, management can be more effective by considering how people can interact with technology to boost productivity and efficiency. Academy of Management Scholar Wendy Smith of the University of Delaware said that doing so requires that senior management shift their mindsets to frame the relationship between humans and AI in the context of what works in their organization.
“One of the roles of leaders is to understand how AI and humans work together,” Smith said. “We tend to think of how technology will replace human, which is an either/or mindset.”
Instead, she urged leaders to frame technology as a complement to, not a replacement for, employees.
“Leaders can adopt a both/and approach, exploring how AI and employees work together to lead to even better outcomes,” Smith said.
Smith advised management to adopt the mindset of using AI to make their team members’ jobs easier and free up time for them to focus on strategic planning and other tasks that require higher-order thinking.
“AI works better because the person and the technology are in a relationship with one another,” Smith said. “We can do better when we ask ourselves, ‘What is this technology good for? What is my level of understanding of it? What am I good for, what do I do well, and how could I work effectively and interdependently with this technology?’”
Smith said that she believes that while AI can perform certain tasks more efficiently than humans, it ultimately comes down to collaboration. For example, the better the prompts that humans give to a generative AI platform, the better the outputs of the gen AI software. Human expertise can help evaluate and assess the quality of the AI responses.
“If AI is going to work to the best of its capabilities, it’s because I bring real and important contributions to the table,” Smith said.
For managers, the question is no longer whether to use AI but how to grow with it and encourage rank-and-file employees to do the same. Smith said this will require “growth and thoughtfulness.” Smith also underscored the advice for people to “recognize that AI and humans work better together, and to be in learning and growth mode.”
