Misusing AI At Work Is Due To Workers That Entail Bad Apples, Bad Cases, And Bad Barrels

In today’s column, I examine why workers opt to misuse AI while performing various tasks in the workplace. This is increasingly becoming quite a headache and causing widespread organizational harm. Are you shocked that AI would be misused? The usual assumption is that employees will prudently and properly leverage AI as they go about their daily work. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.

I turn to a now-classic research study on why workers at times go bad and do unethical or improper acts. The findings were that this is typically due to bad apples, bad cases, and bad barrels. The same three-pronged pathway for how modern-era AI is misused at work is readily applicable. Companies need to govern AI and prevent these wayward acts from occurring or at least be on the lookout to detect bad acts and quash them at the earliest opportunity.

Let’s talk about it. This analysis of AI breakthroughs is part of my ongoing Forbes column coverage of the latest in AI, including identifying and explaining key AI complexities (see the link here).

AI In The Workplace

The saga of AI adoption is a bumpy road. Companies have been rushing since the advent of ChatGPT in 2022 to adopt the latest generative AI and large language models (LLMs) throughout their organizations. There is an ardent belief that if a company doesn’t move fast enough to use AI, a wily competitor will. An AI-enabled competitor will presumably be a more efficient and effective enterprise, snatching up market share and pulling ahead of non-AI-using firms. You see, no self-respecting CEO wants to fall behind and be accused of having been asleep at the wheel when it comes to implementing AI.

No Sigh Of Relief

The bottom line was that this AI usage had no direct company goal or aim to genuinely aid the company. You might dismiss this as nothing more than a silly exercise. The silliness, though, caused firms to end up with enormous charges for the consumption of AI resources, and had next to nothing of substance in return.