Thirty-four per cent of employees believe that robots would make better decisions than their bosses - if they had access to the right business intelligence that is.
The research, compiled in the Advanced Trends Report 2018/19 by Advanced, revealed that there are no clear leaders driving technological changes across UK businesses.
Furthermore, just 35% of C-Suite and Managing Directors are believed to be driving technological change, while 51% believe that the responsibility falls to IT, followed by finance (19%) and 13% attribute this responsibility to the marketing department.
Unsurprisingly, almost 60% of employees think that fewer than half of the people in their organisation are ready to onboard new technology into the way that they work.
The annual survey - which is the third to be commissioned by British software company Advanced - found that 31% of employees had little confidence that leadership teams were equipped to run a modern digital infrastructure going forward.
Gordon Wilson, CEO at Advanced, says that the influence of disruptive technology is encouraging employers to look at different aspects of business.
He explains: “While robots are unlikely to take on the job of decision maker – the reality is that they are simply not yet suited to such complex tasks and will instead work side-by-side with humans – our findings suggest that employees are dissatisfied with their current leadership, want to get rid of arbitrary decision making and are starting to challenge the norms.
“Leaders need to step up, to provide the clear direction that people need and take charge of the intense technology change happening as a result of the digital era.”
Additionally, the research revealed that 65% would be happy to work alongside robots to eradicate laborious manual processes. And, 72% say that they have already onboarded technology to automate and quicken tasks.
Gordon concludes: “Bosses therefore need to decide who in the business is best placed to drive a change in culture and support all employees in any technology transition. This means helping staff understand how technology will enable them to focus on higher value roles – be it through reskilling and training – and how AI and RPA will positively impact their productivity and job satisfaction”.
