As employers and workers grapple with AI-use mandates, the success of the technology’s adoption will likely depend on — and test — managers who already have a bigger workload than in past years, Gallup’s Jim Harter told CFO Dive.
“The best lever we’ve found so far in terms of AI applications in the workplace is going through the local managers,” said Harter, chief scientist for workplace management and wellbeing at the polling and analytics company. Noting that finance organizations are among the top adopters of AI, Harter said there’s “still a long road ahead in terms of figuring it out.”
Harter pointed to a series of recent Gallup findings underscoring the tension in the workplace that is being reshaped by the new technology.
For example, when workers reported that their managers championed AI, they were more much more likely to say it had “transformed” their work as compared to those with managers who did not, according to a Gallup analysis published Sunday. It included the findings of a Q1 survey of over 20,000 full- and part-time workers.
Harter said managers are effective AI ambassadors because they work more closely with employees and typically know what the jobs entail. That makes them better able to get people experimenting with AI and using it appropriately. However, a flattening of management structures has left many professionals with more direct reports just as they are also being asked to shepherd through AI projects, Harter said.
On average, managers had 12.1 people reporting to them last year, up from 10.9 in 2024, with team size jumping nearly 50% since 2013, according to a January Gallup report.
The wider so-called “spans of control” can be problematic if they prevent managers from proactively supporting employees who need help with AI implementation, Harter said. Without support, the AI can do “more harm than good,” Harter said. “When you build the right culture around those changes they can be more good than harm.”
It’s not altogether clear that managers are ready to handle their new AI responsibilities.
Half (50%) of over 100 chief human resources officers surveyed by Gallup earlier this year said they were not confident in the ability of managers to guide their staff’s AI use.
Despite doubting that their company’s team leaders are capable of realizing the AI “transformation,” 57% of the HR executives polled reported they were providing AI training to managers.
Harter said he was somewhat surprised by the findings, noting that he would have thought that organizations were more prepared to handle the transition. “There’s a lot of upskilling that needs to happen,” he said.
