Over 60% desk workers using AI in their jobs in India: Slack report

The adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is on the rise in India with 61 percent of the desk workforce integrated into their work in India, according to a report by cloud-based messaging platform Slack.

According to Rahul Sharma, Vice President-Sales at Salesforce, "This enthusiasm highlights the transformative potential of AI and its alignment with leadership priorities for innovation and upskilling. However, to fully harness AI’s benefits, there remains uncertainty that agents can address. By introducing AI agents with clearly defined roles and guidelines, businesses can reduce worker anxiety and foster seamless integration into daily tasks".

Despite the enthusiasm, some Indian workers remain hesitant to disclose their use of AI at work. About 21 percent of Indian desk workers said they feel uncomfortable admitting to their managers that they used AI for common workplace tasks due to discomfort around job security, fear of being perceived as less competent, or being seen as lazy.

According to McKinsey, AI could increase corporate profits by $4.4 trillion a year, and Salesforce research finds that sales teams using AI are 1.3x more likely to see revenue increase than those who don’t use it.

94 percent of the Indian workers feel an urgency to become an AI expert but only 40 percent of workers have spent less than five hours learning how to use AI as per the survey. Whereas 30 percent of the global workforce admitted that they have had no AI training at all, including no experimentation.

According to the Slack Workforce Index, global workers with guidance to use AI saw a 13 percent increase in AI adoption since January while global workers with no guidance to use AI saw only a 2 percent rise from 8-10 percent since January.

Globally, nearly 2 in 5 workers said they would prefer working for companies that provide AI tools and enable their use.

The survey included responses from 17,372 workers from Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the US.