Invisible Bystanders: Workers’ experience of AI

Interesting new research by the UTS Human Technology Institute and Essential Research, exploring the experience of Australian workers (nurses, retail workers, and public servants) with AI and automation.

Findings (from the executive summary) included

• The failure to include workers in the development, training and deployment of these systems is creating significant barriers to the technology being embraced

• Workers do not currently feel like they are part of the innovation – technology is imposed on them, not designed with them

• Workers understand that we are in a transformative period in the interaction between technology and society and are not inherently opposed to the adoption of AI in their workplace

• Workers have a clear sense of where the ethical red lines are

The research suggests a range of policy opportunities for further exploration:

• Industry AI Workers Councils – where worker voice is embedded in innovation and change is negotiated

• Positive obligations on employers to take all reasonable steps to avoid harm – akin to WHS requirements.

• Limits to how and why workers are subject to ongoing surveillance.

• Staffing guarantees – such as nurse: patient ratios to ensure technology is deployed to improve work not replace workers.

Peter Lewis, an executive director of Essential wrote about the research in The Guardian, ‘Scarlett Johansson won’t save us from AI – but if workers have their say, it could benefit us all’.