Skip to main content

68% of employees say, AI to partially or fully automate their jobs: IIM-A study

By Our Representative 
An Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) report has claimed that white-collar workers are ready to embrace AI-driven transformations, even as admitting that the gap in AI education and upskilling needs to be filled in.
The report, said to be amongst the earliest studies of the topic, says, it provides critical inputs for informed policymaking, strategic planning, and effective workforce development initiatives.
The Brij Disa Centre for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (CDSA) at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA), in collaboration with the Wadhwani Foundation, released the report at an IIM-A function on the perceived and expected impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on Indian white-collar workers. 
The event was attended by Professor Bharat Bhasker, Director, IIMA; Prakash Kumar, CEO, Wadhwani Centre for Government Digital Transformation; Professor Sriram Sankaranarayanan, Co-Chairperson (CDSA), IIMA; and authors of the report.
The report, titled “Labour-force Perception about AI - A Study on Indian White-collar Workers”, finds that AI’s impact is not futuristic any longer; it has already begun. Some key findings from the report are:
  • 55% of employees surveyed reported that they have used AI tools at their workplaces. Furthermore, 48% of survey participants indicated that their organisations provided them training to use these tools.
  • The benefits of AI for efficiency and productivity improvement are also being experienced. 72% of respondents acknowledge that AI boosts their work performance, and 59% believe that AI complements their job functions.
  • How much disruption is expected in the job landscape for the white-collar workers? 68% of employees expect AI to partially or fully automate their jobs within the next five years. Further, 40% are concerned that their current skills may become redundant. However, the scenario is not all bleak. 53% of respondents thought AI will create new jobs.
  • The perception survey reveals some structural weaknesses which need to be addressed. The current graduation/postgraduate setup is not optimal for the AI era. The awareness and adoption of AI tools and AI training are low among recent graduates and entry-level workers (less than five years of experience). This may indicate a gap in their current education and training, which organisations can address through training and upskilling programmes.
  • Further AI adoption and awareness is uneven across industries, at least as far as the survey sample is concerned. Education, IT, manufacturing, and healthcare are actively training and exposing employees to AI. Retail and trade, and infrastructure are laggards in this aspect. Public administration is well-informed and tends to expose its employees to AI. A surprise finding in this study is the finance and insurance industry not featuring among the top industries in training and exposing their employees to AI – but this shortfall in perception may be due to the higher expectations from these industries.
Speaking during the report launch, Professor Bharat Bhasker, Director, IIMA, said, “We must accept the fact that AI, ML, AR-VR, and other cutting-edge technologies have transitioned from being mere elements of science fiction to becoming integral parts of our present reality. The AI age is upon us, and its influence is growing significantly within the workforce and across various industries."
Businesses and employees are realising the potential for enhanced efficiency and innovation through AI technologies, while industries are beginning to grasp the transformative impact of AI on everything from customer service to product development. This report is very timely as it provides critical insights into the growing awareness and adoption of AI by employees and businesses for long-term success”, he added.
Sharing insights about the report, Professor Anindya Chakrabarti, a faculty member in the Economics Area of IIMA and lead Principal Investigator of the study, said, “AI is a strategic imperative for India, critical for maintaining and enhancing its economic competitiveness. In face of the global concerns about the negative effects of AI on employment, the Indian corporate sector and policymakers must understand how AI can sustain and complement employment rather than substituting it."
According to him, "With a strong talent pool, a vibrant startup ecosystem, and a data-rich environment, India is well-positioned to capitalize on AI advancements. The study shows the white-collar workforce is embracing AI tools, and that is a good thing."
"Business leaders and policymakers should recognize the high adoption rate as a pivotal moment in India’s pursuit of AI advancement. The report advocates the need of AI-centric coordination at the national level to build strong collaboration among academia, industry, and government and spearhead diverse efforts to maintain a balanced path between productivity growth and concentration of economic gain”, he added.
This research report represents one of the earliest efforts to understand AI’s impact on India’s white-collar workforce, offering valuable insights for policymakers, business leaders, and the academic community for informed policy-making, strategic planning, and effective workforce development initiatives, said an IIM-A source.
The findings are based on detailed interviews with 31 business executives, a field survey of over 550 white-collar employees, and an analysis of over 70,000 job vacancies in India from public data sources.
The report is co-authored by Prof. Anindya Chakrabarti - Economics Area, IIMA; Prof. Ankur Sinha - Operation and Decision Sciences Area and Co-Chairperson (CDSA), IIMA; Prof. Aditya C. Moses - Human Resource Management Area, IIMA; Mr. Deep Narayan Mukherjee - Partner, Boston Consulting Group (BCG); Mr. Debjit Ghatak – former Centre Head, Brij Disa CDSA, IIMA; and Amita Todkar - Research Associate, Brij Disa CDSA, IIMA; along with Wadhwani Foundation as the research partner.
---
Click on this link to access the report

Comments

Post a Comment

TRENDING

Modi govt distancing from Adanis? MoEFCC 'defers' 1500 MW project in Western Ghats

By Rajiv Shah  Is the Narendra Modi government, in its third but  what would appear to be a weaker avatar, seeking to show that it would keep a distance, albeit temporarily, from its most favorite business house, the Adanis? It would seem so if the latest move of the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) latest to "defer" the Adani Energy’s application for 1500 MW Warasgaon-Warangi Pump Storage Project is any indication.
Post a Comment
Read more

India’s climate tech ecosystem in dire need of both early, growth-stage funding: Report

By Our Representative India’s climate tech ecosystem, which boasts over 800 startups, is in dire need of both early and growth-stage funding to leverage its full potential, according to a report by Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (Ventures) and MUFG Bank , Japan. Despite a robust initial funding landscape, with approximately two-thirds of climate tech startups receiving seed capital, growth-stage investments remain critically lacking. 
1 comment
Read more

'Flawed' argument: Gandhi had minimal role, naval mutinies alone led to Independence

Counterview Desk Reacting to a Counterview  story , "Rewiring history? Bose, not Gandhi, was real Father of Nation: British PM Attlee 'cited'" (January 26, 2016), an avid reader has forwarded  reaction  in the form of a  link , which carries the article "Did Atlee say Gandhi had minimal role in Independence? #FactCheck", published in the site satyagrahis.in. The satyagraha.in article seeks to debunk the view, reported in the Counterview story, taken by retired army officer GD Bakshi in his book, “Bose: An Indian Samurai”, which claims that Gandhiji had a minimal role to play in India's freedom struggle, and that it was Netaji who played the crucial role. We reproduce the satyagraha.in article here. Text: Nowadays it is said by many MK Gandhi critics that Clement Atlee made a statement in which he said Gandhi has ‘minimal’ role in India's independence and gave credit to naval mutinies and with this statement, they concluded the whole freedom struggle.
9 comments
Read more

Bayer's business model: 'Monopoly control over chemicals, seeds'

By Bharat Dogra*  The Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) has rendered a great public service by very recently publishing a report titled ‘Bayer’s Toxic Trails’ which reveals how the German agrochemical giant Bayer has been lobbying hard to promote glyphosate and GMOs, or trying to “capture public policy to pursue its private interests.” This report, written by Joao Camargo and Hans Van Scharen, follows Bayer’s toxic trail as “it maintains monopolistic control of the seed and pesticides markets, fights off regulatory challenges to its toxic products, tries to limit legal liability, and exercises political influence.” 
Post a Comment
Read more

105,000 sign protest petition, allege Nestlé’s 'double standard' over added sugar in baby food

By Kritischer Konsum*    105,000 people have signed a petition calling on Nestlé to stop adding sugar to its baby food products marketed in lower-income countries. It was handed over today at the multinational’s headquarters in Vevey, where the NGOs Public Eye, IBFAN and EKO dumped the symbolic equivalent of 10 million sugar cubes, representing the added sugar consumed each day by babies fed with Cerelac cereals. In Switzerland, such products are sold with no added sugar. The leading baby food corporation must put an end to this harmful double standard.
Post a Comment
Read more

UNEP report on how climate crisis is impacting displacement, global conflicts, declining health

By Shankar Sharma*  A recent report by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), titled "A Global Foresight Report on Planetary Health and Human Wellbeing," warrants urgent attention from our country’s developmental perspective. The findings, detailed in the report, should be a source of significant concern not only globally but especially for our nation, which has a vast population and limited natural resources. 
Post a Comment
Read more

Swami Vivekananda's views on caste and sexuality were 'painfully' regressive

By Bhaskar Sur* Swami Vivekananda now belongs more to the modern Hindu mythology than reality. It makes a daunting job to discover the real human being who knew unemployment, humiliation of losing a teaching job for 'incompetence', longed in vain for the bliss of a happy conjugal life only to suffer the consequent frustration.
59 comments
Read more

A Hindu alternative to Valentine's Day? 'Shiv-Parvati was first love marriage in Universe'

By Rajiv Shah*   The other day, I was searching on Google a quote on Maha Shivratri which I wanted to send to someone, a confirmed Shiv Bhakt, quite close to me -- with an underlying message to act positively instead of being negative. On top of the search, I chanced upon an article in, imagine!, a Nashik Corporation site which offered me something very unusual. 
26 comments
Read more

Militants, with ten times number of arms compared to those in J&K, 'roaming freely' in Manipur

By Sandeep Pandey*  The violence which shows no sign of abating in the ongoing Meitei-Kuki conflict in Manipur is a matter of concern. The alienation of the two communities and hatred generated for each other is unprecedented. The Meiteis cannot leave Manipur by road because the next district North on the way to Kohima in Nagaland is Kangpokpi, a Kuki dominated area where the young Kuki men and women are guarding the district borders and would not let any Meitei pass through the national highway. 
Post a Comment
Read more