Artificial intelligence (AI) has already found its way into the everyday working life of many companies in Germany – and according to a survey, the majority of their employees see it as helpful. In the survey commissioned by the auditing firm PwC, almost four out of ten employees (38 percent) said they use so-called generative AI applications in their job. On the company side, 45 percent already use tools such as ChatGPT, DeepL or Microsoft Copilot.
85 percent of respondents whose companies already use AI said that they can complete tasks faster thanks to such applications. 83 percent also reported greater creativity when creating content with AI. According to the survey, the technologies are most commonly used in companies for text creation (43 percent) and translations (38 percent). Almost a third (32 percent) use artificial intelligence for research tasks, customer support or answering emails. And around one in four companies uses AI tools to create reports or manage social media channels.
PwC expert: SMEs still cautious
Hendrik Reese, AI expert at PwC, spoke of rapid development. The fact that almost every second company uses such applications also means, conversely, “that the other half is not yet exploiting many of the potentials for greater efficiency or digital business models.” Medium-sized companies have so far been cautious. “AI solutions are often only implemented in isolated cases,” added Uwe Rittmann, who heads the Family Business and Medium-Sized Enterprises division at PwC Germany. However, interest in AI is also generally high among these companies.
But there are also concerns. Almost every second person surveyed (46 percent) fears that AI can also be misused. A total of 22 percent of working people expressed concern that AI would “leave them behind and render them useless.” These fears are more widespread among younger working people in the 18 to 29 age group (27 percent), while only 17 percent of 60 to 65 year olds have this concern.
Employees admit knowledge gaps
The survey also shows a great willingness to train in AI tools – but also a lot of catching up to do. Only a good quarter of those surveyed (28 percent) have already completed one or more training courses on generative AI. Around a third (33 percent) of those surveyed say they have very good or good knowledge of this topic. Just under a third (32 percent) rate their own knowledge as sufficient, almost one in four employees admitted in the survey that they had insufficient knowledge (24 percent) and 11 percent stated that they had no knowledge at all.
© dpa-infocom, dpa:240917-930-234468/1
This is a message directly from the dpa news channel.
