ARTIFICIAL intelligence is no longer the future— it’s the present, and Gen Z is leading the charge.
In a recent survey conducted by The Harris Poll and Google Workspace, it was found that the majority of Gen Z workers are using generative AI tools to help them in their jobs.
Ninety-three percent of those who identified themselves as belonging to Gen Z said that they incorporate two or more AI tools weekly, while 79 percent of millennials said that they do the same.
It is important to note that the participants of this survey were US-based ‘knowledge workers’— these are the professionals whose jobs primarily involve the processing and handling of information, rather than physical labor.
These are the tech workers, analysts, engineers, and others who rely mostly on their intellectual capital.
The survey has 1,005 respondents aged 22 to 39 years old. Most of them aspire to hold a leadership position in their companies.
“Our research shows that emerging leaders are adopting A.I. to increase their impact at work,” Yulie Kwon Kim, Google’s Vice President of Product for Workspace, stated.
“Rising leaders are not simply using A.I. as a tool for efficiency, but as a catalyst to help grow their careers.”
Most of the individuals surveyed said that they incorporate the use of AI to the communication aspects of their job.
For instance, 70 percent of them use AI in tasks such as drafting an email, writing responses or reports, or overcoming language barriers.
Meanwhile, 88 percent said that AI helps them overcome tasks that they find difficult to start, while another 88 percent said that it helps them find the right tone in their writing tasks.
Ninety percent of the respondents also said that they are more comfortable joining meetings if AI was taking notes for them.
It also seems that AI plays a huge role in managerial positions as 86 percent of the respondents believe that AI can help current leaders become better managers, while 79 percent are interested in using AI to become a better manager.
Some— or at least 47 percent—also believe that AI’s role is not solely on the objective parts of the work, but that it can also help with enhancing communication for better workplace problem solving and relationships.
What this means for the workplace
The growing use of AI technology among Gen Z and Millennials is set to transform the future workplace by making it the norm.
One change we could expect would be the automation of repetitive tasks, allowing employees to focus on more strategic and creative works. It also improves collaborations using smart tools, as what we’ve seen with the integrated note-takers and AI transcriptors used by online communication technologies like Zoom and Google Meet.
However, AI also presents potential challenges for the future generation.
The rapid integration of AI can lead to job displacement as some roles become automated or require new skill sets that employees must quickly adapt to. For example, a Goldman Sachs report suggests that AI could automate tasks affecting 300 million full-time positions worldwide.
Another drawback of AI use is the perpetuation of biases in its systems, which rely on a dataset that is more likely influenced by the dominant ideologies. For instance, a study from the USC Information Sciences Institute found that up to 38.6% of ‘facts’ used by AI systems exhibited bias.
AI in the Philippine Academe
In the Philippines, the challenges posed by AI are most evident in the academe, particularly in honing the students’ critical thinking skills and academic integrity.
While AI powered tools can enhance learning by providing easy and immediate access to information, the overreliance on them could lead to a weakened critical thinking and questionable academic performance— the latter of which has been an on-going problem among Philippine educational institutions.
This leads to the universities setting their own guidelines of AI usage.
One of the earliest to release a guideline regarding AI use was the University of the Philippines Los Baños Graduate School in which they allowed the use of AI solely for improving readability and language enhancement, but not for the creation of content (e.g. writing academic papers).
They also stated that if AI has been used in the paper or in any academic outputs, the student must have it declared.
Balancing AI with originality
AI is not the future— it is the present and it is our reality now. It is not something that we can still stop as technology continues to evolve.
But ultimately, we are still the one deciding on how we are going to use it. Striking a balance between leveraging AI’s benefits and maintaining human ingenuity will be essential.
The future of AI is not about replacing human intelligence but augmenting it—ensuring that technology serves as a tool for progress rather than a substitute for critical thought and meaningful work.
