Notices by Odin Halvorson (indubitablyodin@sfba.social), page 2

When managers and executives observe little organizational improvement from AI, there are a few ways their thought process can go. Perhaps, they might think, AI is all hype? Or maybe they just need to train their workers in AI use?
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Plenty of workers aren’t interested in sharing their AI use with their employers, either. Some might be afraid of losing their jobs if their AI use is found out, others don’t want to be given more work to fill the gaps that AI has created for them.
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However, these efforts all fail to tackle the central concept of AI use: that the real gains are staying right the fuck where they should–with the workers themselves. While individual employees might experience real productivity gains, these benefits are often invisible to corporate leadership
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My point is that, far from being lost in the ether, the benefits of AI are going exactly where they should — into the hands of workers and out of the pockets of the exploitative class.
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Many companies are also trying to create top-down “one-size-fits-all” approaches to AI use in the workplace, and these are almost invariably destined to fail. AI implementation works best when it’s holistic and bottom-up, built from the existing workflows inherent in the organization.
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One way AI is helping employees is by eliminating the drudgery of mundane tasks, allowing them to focus on more meaningful and creative work.
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Employees are using AI tools to streamline their daily tasks, getting back valuable time, becoming more autonomous, and living with less stress. People are using the AI gains to live better and be happier, and that’s a good thing.
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Being able to enjoy their lives while doing just enough to maintain a reasonable measure of productivity is a perfectly acceptable baseline — especially when you consider how badly exploited most workers are. (Think about it: your life’s hours are being traded away for someone else’s profits.
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If it were up to the corporate leadership, this would also translate into doing more within the time allotted — but doing more isn’t the point. Doing better isn’t the point, either.
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Rather than spending hours on administrative duties or repetitive processes, workers can use AI to automate these tasks and free up time for deeper, more impactful projects.
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mental health needs. Or, it could mean carving out time for socializing with coworkers, building stronger workplace relationships and improving team dynamics.
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That’s just not right.)

If one of the main uses of workers is to use the time saved by AI to foster better work-life balance, I say: “Good for them.” This could mean having more time to handle personal matters during the workday, such as caring for family members or attending to their own
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In fact, AI might be serving a far more wholesome purpose — helping employees lead better, more balanced lives. By removing inefficiencies from their workflows, workers are reclaiming time, not to churn out more work, but to engage in humanizing activities.
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But whatever their end use: the point is simply that it’s good that workers are using AI to support their own needs rather than the needs of the corporations that parasitize their very lives. This shouldn’t be a radical idea, but AI doesn’t have to be about maximizing corporate profits.
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For companies that want to be AI leaders, the way forward is pretty darned simple: they need to shift their focus from short-term productivity to long-term employee well-being. Companies could also align their reward systems with AI-enabled productivity gains.
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And if workers are hiding their AI use? That makes sense: corporations can’t be trusted ever, so these workers are doing the smart thing. So what should the corpos do?
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Corporations that provide positive support for AI experimentation will ensure that their workers continue to implement AI in ways that actually work.
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If employees are successfully using and working with AI, they should be recognized and rewarded for it. This could take the form of cash bonuses, promotions, or greater flexibility in their work arrangements.
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This shift from profit-driven AI to human-centered AI is the true opportunity of our time — and it’s a change that’s well worth embracing.

👋 Hi there! I’m Odin Halvorson, a librarian 📚, independent scholar 📖, film fanatic 🎬, fiction author 📝, and tech enthusiast 💻.
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And this process of creating a tech-literate, happy, and mentally healthy workforce will pay dividends over the span of decades (if not the span of individual financial years).
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