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Every company seems intent on incorporating AI, but the gains may not have a long shelf life. After the initial “productivity boost,” employees who used AI reported more intense work days, poorer work-life balance, and produced lower-quality work overall, according to an ongoing study first. published This week in Harvard Business Review.
Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, studied the habits and behaviors of about 200 people who use generative artificial intelligence in their work at a technology company for eight months. The company offered employees enterprise-level subscriptions to AI products. Employees were not required to use AI, but many workers did. What happened next is exactly what AI companies hoped would happen: employees who used AI worked faster and took on more responsibilities. But there were unintended consequences that demonstrated the limits of current AI tools used in the workplace.
One of the biggest selling points of AI in the workplace is that it can help employees handle tasks that may be outside their expertise or skill set. For example, non-developers can now use programming for almost any project. The authors noted that employees in the study did just that, taking on work that could have been delegated or avoided. So employees inadvertently created more work for themselves, put more on their shoulders and struggled to balance it all.
Read more: Does artificial intelligence put jobs at risk? A recent study found an important distinction
We also know that AI as a business hack is not without its downsides. AI output is rarely ready to go without first being reviewed by a real human. A September 2025 study found that employees spend hours each week dealing with their colleagues and their low-quality or error-riddled work, sometimes called “com. workslop“2025.” Enterprise report OpenAI said employees saved an average of just 40 to 60 minutes per week, with more time freed up for powerful AI users.
This time saved by AI may not have made a measurable difference to work-life balance. In fact, employees in the UC Berkeley study ended up working longer hours. The always-available, user-friendly nature of AI made it easy for them to make an inquiry during their lunch break or ask a quick question after logging out.
Even when employees felt the presence of a digital partner, their cognitive loads did not necessarily decrease, and there were still expectations to achieve results quickly because they were using AI to help. That’s why UC Berkeley researchers said AI is more likely to “intensify” work rather than reduce it.
Authors Aruna Ranganathan and Xingqi Maggie Yi offer culture- and norms-centric solutions that companies can adopt to prevent AI burnout. This includes protecting human contact time, prioritizing quality outcomes over speed, and ensuring employees block out focus time without AI interruption. Using AI intentionally – both inside and outside of work – is one of the best ways to prevent misuse and create a non-negligent business.
Across industries, workers worry that advances in artificial intelligence will eliminate their jobs. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei He said recently AI could lead to “extraordinarily painful” short-term disruptions to the workforce. and Most recent seizures Amazon’s thousands of layoffs were implemented explicitly because the company expected AI to fill gaps and help remaining employees do more with less. But we’ve seen ample evidence that while AI can help you do some tasks, it’s unlikely to actually fulfill them. Entire roles In most industries.