May AI unclog your mental block at work?

Dubai - Workers increasingly finding it comfortable to have robots relieve their stress

With 2020 already the most stressful year in a recent memory, people are looking for ways to vent out their frustrations.
And robots - once seen as a threat to displace workers - seem to be in the right place to provide that solace.
A new study from Oracle and HR research and advisory firm Workplace Intelligence shows that people are becoming more comfortable with robots helping them out. It says that the Covid-19 pandemic has indeed increased workplace stress, in addition to anxiety and burnout among employees, and people are finding it apparently more comforting to have artificial intelligence-powered machines around them.
Makes sense, since each person has to be experiencing stress in one form or another. And organisations must realise that now is the time to start discussing this and explore solutions to this, says Dan Schawbel, managing partner at Workplace Intelligence.
"With remote work expectations and blurred lines between personal and professional lives, the toll of Covid-19 on our mental health is significant - and it's something that workers across every industry and country are dealing with," he wrote in the report.
"The pandemic has put mental health front and centre - it's the biggest workforce issue of our time and will be for the next decade."
In the study, 87 per cent of UAE respondents say their company must do more to protect mental health, with 54 per cent claiming their organisations have added initiatives to support this as a result of Covid-19.
Of course, tech is a popular option: 84 per cent of UAE respondents believe that robots would be able to support their mental health at the workplace, with 94 per cent saying that they would like their company to provide technology to support them, including self-service access to health resources, on-demand counselling services, proactive health monitoring tools, access to wellness or meditation apps and chatbots to answer health-related queries.
And only 16 per cent prefer humans to support their mental health needs, and for good reasons: They believe that robots provide a judgement-free zone, an unbiased outlet to share problems and quick answers.
AI has also helped the majority (60 per cent) to shorten their work week and allowed them to take longer vacations (61 per cent). Furthermore, 69 per cent say that it increases employee productivity, improves job satisfaction (60 per cent) and overall well-being (61 per cent).
Bad and good
In the UAE, 91 per cent of respondents say that mental health issues at work affect their lives at home, with the most common repercussions being poor physical health (43 per cent), reduced suffering family relationships (35 per cent) and isolation from friends (34 per cent), among others.
It also doesn't help that 52 per cent of them are working an additional 40 hours per month, with 29 per cent suffering from burnout as a result of overworking.
"With the global pandemic, mental health has become not only a broader societal issue, but a top workplace challenge. It has a profound impact on individual performance, team effectiveness and organisational productivity," said Emily He, senior vice-president of the human capital management cloud business group at Oracle.
She adds that while there is a lot that can be done to support the mental health of the global workforce and there are so many ways that technology like AI can help, organisations must first add mental health into their agenda.
"If we can get these conversations started - both at an HR and an executive level - we can begin to make some change. And the time is now.
Meanwhile, remote working has also appealed to others: 68 per cent say the endeavour has allowed them to, among others, spend more time with their family, sleep and get work done.
- alvin@khaleejtimes.com