Generative AI at Work

Empirical study with more than 5,000 customer-support agents. AI increases productivity 15% on average, but the effect is uneven: less experienced workers improve 30% in speed and also in quality, while the most experienced barely improve and can even degrade slightly in quality. AI compresses the learning curve — agents with two months of experience perform like agents with six months without AI. Essentially, AI captures the tacit knowledge of the best performers and distributes it. It is empirical evidence of cognitive decentralisation: something that used to live in a few heads now flows through the entire team.