Artificial intelligence (AI) is infiltrating all industries, meaning a transformation in the way we live our day-to-day lives – and the way we work – is inevitable. But this is nothing to be afraid of and we should embrace AI to improve the way we work.

According to Adobe, 15 % of companies currently use AI, with 31 % expected to adopt it over the next 12 months. This significant technological disruption is set to affect everyone in some form, and many are worried that AI will displace our jobs and make humans irrelevant.

However, Reed Accountancy & Finance research found that almost half (47 %) of finance professionals asked are enthusiastic about AI in the workplace and are willing to embrace new technology. This shows there is a lot of enthusiasm about all the ways AI can improve our everyday activities. With this in mind, here are five reasons why we shouldn’t be panicking about the introduction of AI into the workplace.

1. There is strength in humanity

Research from Deloitte shows that 61 % of companies are now actively designing jobs around robotics. However, it is expected that, in the coming years, the skills and traits that make us human and enable us to interact effectively will become increasingly important for employment and career advancement.  While machines and AI will be capable of performing many routine tasks, human cognitive skills will still be sought after, so businesses will still need to target candidates with these talents. The introduction of AI will also free up time for creative thinking and judgement work – areas in which humans are naturally superior. AI can design solutions to complex societal issues, but only humans can implement them, as well as display empathy and compassion in a way machines never can.

2. Enhanced productivity

A study by Accenture has revealed that AI could increase productivity by 40 %, and profitability by 38 %. This is in addition to our own research which found a third (32 %) of finance professionals believe AI will improve productivity and efficiency by having the capabilities to report and summarise accounts  taking away the menial tasks – understandably, businesses are interested. This means employees are free to concentrate their efforts on more stimulating, forward thinking work, making companies using AI very attractive. It can also help with recruitment, where AI can source, rank and arrange interviews with candidates. More accurate forecasting, predicting maintenance and repairs, personalisation, optimising manufacturing and replenishing stock automatically are all areas in which AI can also help companies become more efficient working within their budgets.

3. Attracting Generation Z

By 2030, it’s estimated that Generation Z will represent 75 % of the workforce, meaning innovative methods of appealing to this group must be a priority for all organisations. One way to do this is by promoting the use of AI in the workplace, as this generation appreciates the value that technology brings.  The use of AI-driven foundational technologies, such as blockchain, may also help companies that are based on this technology present themselves as the more fashionable, innovative places to work.

4. Saying farewell to unconscious bias

Unconscious bias has long been an issue in recruitment, and for those responsible for recruitment in an organisation. Some tech start-ups are already using AI to perform initial interviews, along with facial recognition software to detect body language and emotion cues when screening candidates, in order to eliminate the unconscious bias that is so often found in the human decision-making process. In fact, according to KPMG, 60 % of HR departments are planning to adopt cognitive automation in the next five years with the aim of making recruitment a bias-free procedure.

5. New skills, new jobs

McKinsey research has found that, if AI is adopted by 2030, eight to nine % of labour demand will be in new types of jobs that didn’t exist before. History would suggest that, after a large technological disruption in society, over time, labour markets would adjust in the favour of workers. However, the skills and capabilities required for any job will shift, with the need for more social and emotional skills, such as logical reasoning and creativity, making candidates with these skills in heavy demand.

Navigating the unchartered territory of artificial intelligence can be daunting, but there is no need for businesses or candidates to panic. If used in the right way, AI can be incredibly helpful and vastly improve the effectiveness and efficiency of not just many organisations, but our everyday working lives.

If you don’t already have a stylus, you know how frustrating taking notes can be. Whether you’re in a meeting, on a call, brainstorming ideas or just writing your thoughts down, having a stylus making things so much easier and much more efficient.

1. With a stylus, you can easily write and customise each and every one of your important emails or texts. In addition to easily editing photos or designs necessary for work, users can write and quickly save notes and even add numbers or texts to them and save/share them directly. The ease is in the flick of your wrist, rather than the more time-consuming option of typing things out or scanning in hand drawn images. When it comes to brainstorming and diagramming, having a stylus is a no brainer.
2. The latest apps, both on iOS and android, allow stylus to integrate with your workflow and transform your organic work patterns into digital form. Just look up any apps that related to your professional area of expertise, and see that having a stylus will improve your workflow in at least one or two simple ways.
3. While bigger phone screens or tablets mean better viewing and more space for apps and notetaking, it also means awkward hand positions while typing or the fear of dropping your phone/making too many mistakes while writing something. Stylus pens allow users to easily hold the phone in one hand and write away with the other without any fear.
4. Stylus pens can save the day and a whole lot of screen trouble as they're specially designed for your smartphone/tablet screens and keep the screens completely safe. They'll not only keep your precious phone screen scratch and smudge free but even save you money for screen damage repairs.
5. The most obvious benefit perhaps, and while not exactly a performance booster directly, is the fact you’ll likely never have to buy pens or notepads again. Just forget them entirely, because the future is digital, and the solution is getting yourself a stylus.

With the right stylus, you can work smarter, create more, get organized, and write or draw on your tablet with ease. The Adonit stylus family has a wide variety of options and offers something for everyone. The Mini stylus for example, is available for just £17.25.

Adonit Ink PRO Windows Specific Stylus for Business – Available from Amazon for £79.99

Certified by Microsoft, Adonit’s Ink PRO provides a turnkey stylus solution to any Window’s device and the perfect business accessory. Write and draw in exquisite detail with Ink PRO’s 1mm fine point tip and the pressure sensitive stylus will emulate real handwriting with lines appear thicker or thinner depending on how hard you press with Ink while driving. The Palm Rejection feature also means that you can write comfortably without worrying about extra marks on the page and the shortcut buttons allow you to erase and right click with ease. With the ability to work with Cortana for voice control, you can set up meetings with ease and the laser pointer is ideal for when doing a big presentation.

Adonit Droid for Android – Available from Amazon for £19.99

Designed exclusively for Android high resolution touchscreen devices, the Droid is Adonit’s first micro precision disc stylus for Android. Featuring a newly engineered 4.75mm micro-size disc made of PET material to never scratch or damage the screen, it is the perfect accessory for touchscreen users whether for design, notes or doodling. It can be used with many apps such as notetaking OneNote or SketchBook to be more creative and simply connected to any device without batteries or pairing so no problem to use when in a rush! The dampening tip also helps writing with a stylus to be a more natural experience and prevent mistakes or errors.

For the iPad, there is also the Pixel - £59.25 on Amazon

The Pixel offers unparalleled precision, increased tip drag, and pressure sensitivity for natural writing and drawing across all the latest iPad models. The Pixel’s improved 1.9mm tip creates a paper-like drag that’s more precise and responsive than ever before.

The Pixel is a pressure sensitive stylus with 2048 levels of sensitivity. Now, you can create nuanced strokes of varying width and weight like an ink pen or brush. PALM REJECTION - Rest your palm comfortably on screen without fear of unwanted marks. SHORTCUT BUTTONS - Programmable shortcut buttons give you easy, one-touch access to your most used tools like erase, redo, and scroll to zoom. The Pixel’s brushed aluminium body and sleek, ergonomic design define its aesthetic as an iconic multimedia tool. Pixel is as pleasing to the eye as it is to the hand. The built in grip sensor activates Pixel when you pick it up after it has first been turned on. Now, there’s no more waiting, Pixel is always ready when you are.

Adonit Mini 4 Pocket Sized Universal Stylus – Available from Amazon for £17.25

The Mini 4 is a pocket sized stylus from Adonit that features a precision disc to write exactly where it is placed as users can see down to the point with the transparent disc. The new dampening tip is engineered into one piece for added stability whilst still providing a pen to paper feel. Untwist at the colour seam to reveal the disc, flip it around and twist closed to securely attach and then use the laser cut clip to make it easy and simple to carry whilst traveling. Available in four colours and compatible with all touchscreen devices it is the ideal stylus.

Adonit Snap 2 Stylus – Available from Amazon for £29.99

Designed specifically for social media users, the Snap 2 combines both a digital pen with a Bluetooth camera shutter remote. Featuring a PixelPoint precision tip that allows for personalizing photos and doodles, writing or drawing with the pen will be both accurate and feel comfortable with its lightweight design. The Bluetooth camera shutter remote allows users to take photos at the press of a button. Whether selfies or group shots, the Snap 2 lets users capture the perfect moment. With a single burst option and a new triple burst, photos can either be taken with one shot or three continuous shots. Rechargeable in 1 hour to give 12 hours of battery life and a magnetic back that will stick to any iPhone it is perfect for on the go.

Creating a balanced and even workflow will optimise productivity for robots – in the same way as it will for human workers.

Surely robots don’t get tired, can work 24/7, are fully skilled at what they are programmed to do, and don’t have any pesky motivational issues – so their productivity must always be consistently high? Absolutely not. This is according to Neil Bentley, Non-Executive Director & Co-Founder of ActiveOps, a leading provider of digital operations management solutions.

To believe this would be to forget everything we have learned about Lean Workflow and the way production systems work. For a processor (robot or human) productivity is best measured as a ratio of output:input. How much work did we get out for the amount of time we put in? For this to make sense we generally convert time into “capacity to do work” based on some idea of how much work could be done in a given time.

So, if Person A completes 75 tasks in a day and they had capacity to complete 100 then their productivity was 75%. Similarly, if Robot B completes 500 tasks in a day and had capacity to do 1,000 then their productivity would be 50%.

As we begin to increase our investment in Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and AI: the productivity of this (potentially) cheaper processing resource will matter – if not so much now then certainly when everyone is employing RPA to do similar tasks within the same services.”

But why would Robot B only do 500 tasks? They wouldn’t dawdle because they didn’t like their boss. They wouldn’t spend hours on social media, and they would surely only be allocated tasks that they were 100% capable of processing.

Maybe Robot B could only process 500 tasks because there were only 500 available to be done. Maybe the core system was running incredibly slowly that day, or there was so much network traffic that latency was affecting cycle times. Maybe someone changed a port on a firewall and the robot needed to be reset. Or there were hundreds of exceptions and the robot had to try them multiple times before rejecting them.

It is strange (isn’t it?) that if a person’s productivity is 50% we assume idleness, a propensity to waste time on social media, or a lack of skill but if it is a robot we quickly understand that it is the workflow that is the problem,” he continued.

Data-focused technologies such as Process Forensics and some digital operations management technologies or WFO technologies that seek to improve performance by URL logging or other screen monitoring techniques are totally missing the point: people’s productivity is far more influenced by the flow of work through the system than it is by their willingness to work or their skill level.

Workforce monitoring technologies seek to intimidate people into working harder, but you can’t intimidate people into having more work available to do. Equally, fluctuating demand, bottlenecks in the workflow, variations in work complexity will all drive variations in productivity – as with people, so it is with robots,” he added.

The answer is to introduce digital operations management solutions in the back office that will be the result of a blended human/RPA strategy made up of:

• Some degree of “demand smoothing” – using service level agreements to allow for carrying some work from one period to the next to even out resource requirements

• Some degree of cross-team collaboration – moving work or people between teams to balance demand and capacity.

The plain fact of the matter is that with humans and robotics increasingly working alongside one another in service operations a blended and balanced approach needs to be taken on the issue of productivity.

Today saw the launch of ONS’s economic statistics theme days, with today’s releases focusing on productivity. Following the release of the latest figures, Phil Sheridan, senior managing director at specialised recruitment agency, Robert Half UK commented:

“One of the most common reasons productivity declines is due to a lack of employee morale and general unhappiness in the workplace.

“Business success hinges on a motivated and productive workforce. Yet new regulations, a growing talent shortage and the emergence of hot fintech start-ups means financial services is an industry ripe for disruption - our research shows that 86 per cent of financial services leaders have concerns about losing a top performer as the competition for talent intensifies.

“To help drive productivity upwards, financial services firms need to prioritise initiatives designed to boost job satisfaction and retain employees. For example, recognising employee success, giving clear direction and having open communication foster a culture where employees feel pride and appreciation in the workplace, helping create more fulfilled staff that consistently deliver the output the financial industry needs.

“Ultimately, a business is the sum of its parts. Without a focus on boosting staff productivity, organisations will quickly fall behind.”

A summary of today’s Productivity figures can be found here: https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/labourproductivity/articles/ukproductivityintroduction/julytosept2016