Call Center Management Featured Article
AI Will Fill the Manager's Role in Workplace of the Future
AI is infiltrating the workplace in myriad ways, automating routine and mundane tasks and freeing up human workers to focus on more complex jobs. AI and associated technologies also collect massive amounts of data about customers and workflows and analyze and mine them for actionable intelligence to provide better levels of customer interaction and improve workflow processes. Increasingly, AI is also taking on a leadership role and filling in for traditional roles typically handled by the “boss” or manager.
While it’s pretty clear that AI can’t replace the role of a human boss, it can certainly augment leadership tasks and roles. AI technology is already being successfully used by human resources departments to find the best job candidates from massive pools of applicants. And AI and chatbots can be used to coach and inform customer service representatives to provide valuable insights and improve their performance. AI is a clear fit for a host of office management tasks from accounting and payroll to project management and scheduling.
According to a recent Gallup employee engagement index, AI agents are set to replace around two-thirds of managers over the next five years. Those who will be replaced, perhaps unsurprisingly, are those managers who fail to engage their team members. What is surprising, at least according to the predictions made in a recent Forbes article, are the reasons employees will embrace their new AI bosses.
First off, AI bosses lack bias and undesirable behaviors, meaning workers can count on a professional boss who is available 24/7. An AI boss will also inherently know all the characteristics and personality traits of its workers, meaning it should be able to effectively coach and motivate all types of workers. This also means an AI boss can assign responsibilities to the best suited workers and reward them based on outstanding performance and consistency, something many human bosses tend to overlook.
Perhaps one of the most interesting characteristics of the new AI boss will be that workers won’t even think of “it” as a boss. The role of AI will skew more toward that of a job assistant or coach, always available to offer advice and provide useful information to workers. That same AI technology will also be tracking worker performance and constantly monitoring and managing employees, however, always with the goal of improving performance and productivity.
The advent of the AI boss is just one of the many ways the future of work is set to change over the next few years. To learn more about how AI and analytics are transforming the workplace and the customer experience, TMC (News - Alert) is hosting a Future of Work Expo in Fort Lauderdale, FL. The event, which will take place from February 12-14, 2020, will explore how AI and machine learning may be used to improve business communications, collaboration, sales and marketing and contact centers and customer service.
Edited by Maurice Nagle