AI and productivity: How to use AI tools to improve the employee experience

The key to running a successful business is creating an environment where employees can do their best work. But productivity suffers when people struggle to stay in sync with one another or find themselves wasting hours on tedious and repetitive tasks.

Today, 64 percent of people say they struggle with having the time and energy to do their job.¹ And 70 percent of people say they would happily delegate work to AI to lessen their workloads.²Thanks to recent advances in AI, this scenario is becoming a reality for many employees around the world. AI is reinventing the way we work, speeding up communication, easing digital overload, and helping people stay focused on what matters most.

In this article, we’ll explore the many ways organizations can seamlessly weave AI into employees’ everyday routines. With savvy AI integrations and the introduction of powerful AI tools, businesses of all kinds can supercharge the employee experience to boost productivity and improve business outcomes.

Factors that impact business productivity

Strategy, workforce dynamics, innovation, and the specifics of daily operations and technology are crucial for organizational performance. AI can help organizations improve by enabling employees at all levels to make smart decisions, automate essential processes, and get more out of their existing data.

In this section, we’ll look at the various factors influencing business productivity and examine how AI can boost each area. Then, we’ll dive deep into the most critical factor: supporting the employee experience to drive growth, innovation, and improve work performance.

Strategy

A business is only as strong as its strategy—and the decisions made by leadership can have long-term consequences that affect the organization for years to come. AI can help employees at all levels of the organization make smarter decisions and devote their energy to high-value tasks that have potential to increase growth. It’s a great strategic partner in this way.

People

Skilled employees with the right training are any organization’s greatest resource. Without the right people, organizations risk falling behind their competitors, losing market share, and missing opportunities for improvement and expansion. AI productivity tools can help organizations create a more supportive employee experience, reduce overwhelm at work, and facilitate deeper levels of collaboration and innovation.

Technology

In the modern workplace, technology use has a direct impact on business outcomes. The right technology enhances productivity, communication, collaboration, and creativity among employees and customers. It can also lay the groundwork for new business models, products, and services that generate value and a competitive edge.

Operations

AI has numerous applications in business operations. In fact, using AI tools for this purpose is one of the quickest ways to realize productivity gains. AI can perform tasks that are repetitive and time-consuming, help people make smarter and faster decisions, and enable better communication and coordination among employees, customers, and partners across different locations, devices, and platforms.

Innovation

Innovation is essential for any organization that wants to avoid stagnation. Empowering employees to use their creative skills and produce new ideas, products, and services is a good first step. AI can help build on these innovations by testing and improving them, exploring possible outcomes, and finding problems and weaknesses. It’s also good at supporting cross-functional teamwork and predicting future opportunities.

Integrating AI productivity tools into these everyday business activities requires a deep understanding of employees’ experiences and workflows. But the productivity gains are real—and in today’s workplace, getting to the root of employee engagement and efficiency is often the key to gaining a competitive edge.

30 ways to improve work performance with AI tools

There’s a slew of myths surrounding employee productivity. Many believe that constant work and longer hours yield the best results—but it’s quality, not quantity, that truly counts. Sustainable productivity means working smarter, not just longer.

Peak productivity isn’t about being constantly busy, it’s about focus, motivation, and efficiency. Thanks to AI, we now live in a world where technology can work according to peoples’ individual preferences, data, and local context, amplifying their skills and boosting productivity and engagement to unprecedented levels.

From chatbots and virtual assistants to smart scheduling and analytics, AI amplifies employee ingenuity by helping people automate, optimize, learn, and create in new ways. Let’s explore how AI can empower decision makers to improve the employee experience, which can boost productivity and improve work performance.

Automating repetitive tasks

AI-powered automation tools can handle routine tasks like data entry, scheduling, and document processing, freeing up time and energy for more creative and strategic work. For example, AI tools can:

1. Extract data and input it into spreadsheets or databases.

2. Handle routine customer inquiries, such as FAQs, troubleshooting, or order tracking.

3. Scan intake documents for specific information and generate an accurate report.

Optimizing workflows

AI algorithms can optimize workflows by identifying bottlenecks, predicting resource requirements, and recommending process improvements, leading to more efficient operations. For example, AI tools can:

4. Analyze existing processes and identify opportunities for automation.

5. Examine historical sales data to predict future purchase volume.

6. Review deadlines, dependencies, and team workload to recommend action items.

Enhancing decision making

AI can analyze large amounts of data and provide insights, predictions, and recommendations that can help businesses make smarter and faster decisions. For example, AI tools can:

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7. Provide insights into employee sentiment, which can improve their experience and drive productivity.

8. Analyze a launch plan to identify potential gaps or weaknesses.

9. Evaluate vendor options objectively based on factors like pricing and customer reviews.

10. Make suggestions for product improvements based on customer feedback.

Improving communication and productivity

AI-powered tools can streamline communication by answering common questions, summarizing conversations, and even translating content into another language. For example, AI tools can:

11. Help companies drive clarity and purpose in the employee experience through internal communications and performance-tracking tools.

12. Improve the employees’ day-to-day activities through chatbots and virtual assistants.

Brainstorming ideas

AI can use natural language processing and generative models to generate new ideas for projects, such as content creation, product development, or marketing campaigns. For example, AI tools can:

13. Generate tagline options that align with your company’s brand and marketing objectives.

14. Recommend potential enhancements or innovations to a product or service.

15. Suggest decorations, activities, and entertainment for an upcoming event.

Content creation

AI can assist users in creating engaging content, based on the user’s preferences, audience, and objectives. For example, AI tools can:

16. Suggest specific case studies or testimonials based on the needs of different audiences.

17. Create custom digital images to match desired styles, themes, and concepts.

18. Optimize assets for specific social media platforms.

Recording and transcribing meetings

AI can record and transcribe meetings, summarize the key points, action items, and decisions made during the meeting, and share them with the participants. For example, AI tools can:

19. Analyze meetings to extract key points, action items, and decisions made.

20. Extract action items from recordings and organize them into a structured

21. list.Weigh the pros and cons of suggestions brought up during a meeting.

Virtual assistance

AI can act as a virtual assistant, answering questions, providing information, or offering suggestions, so employees get things done faster and easier. This is the magic of AI task management. For example, AI tools can:

22. Ask for an explanation of any topic at a beginner’s level.

23. Compile documents on a specific topic.

24. Explain a technical process in easy-to-follow terms.

Research

AI can help users conduct better research by finding relevant sources, synthesizing findings, and even generating references or bibliographies. This can help users save time, avoid information overload, and access reliable and high-quality information. For example, AI tools can:

25. Search academic papers, journals, and other sources to identify relevant literature.

26. Analyze datasets to uncover patterns that may not be apparent to human researchers.

27. Organize resources for maximum storytelling impact.

Writing and proofreading

AI can help users improve their writing quality, offer suggestions or alternatives, and even detect plagiarism, bias, or tone issues. This can help users produce better material. For example, AI tools can:

28. Automatically detect and correct grammar and spelling errors in written text.

29. Scan written content to detect plagiarism.

30. Generate document summaries that capture the main points and key ideas.

These are just some examples of how AI can be used to boost the employee experience and achieve greater productivity at work. However, AI is not a magic solution that can do everything for us. We still need to use our human skills and judgment to guide and evaluate the AI output, and to ensure that it meets our standards and expectations.

One of the ways we can do this is by writing effective AI prompts that can elicit the best possible response from the AI system. In the next section, we will discuss how to write AI prompts to improve work performance.

Improve the employee experience with AI tools

AI helps lighten the burden of work, enhancing human ingenuity and speeding up everyone’s natural creativity. From automating repetitive tasks to analyzing vast datasets, AI empowers employees to focus on high-value activities and make informed decisions more quickly than ever before.

A few notable examples are the integration of AI into productivity suites, like Microsoft 365, and AI that helps manage the employee experience, like Microsoft Viva. These intelligent tools are designed to seamlessly integrate into existing workflows, ensuring a smooth transition and minimal hassle. With features like real-time collaboration and integration with popular productivity applications, AI empowers employees to work smarter, not harder.

The Microsoft 365 team is focused on sharing resources to help you start, run, and grow your business.

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