AI isn’t making work easier, it’s intensifying it – researchers say teams are now facing 'unsustainable' workloads, cognitive strain, and higher levels of burnout

AI isn't going to make work easier, new research suggests, it’ll make it much more intense.

That's according to an ongoing study from a pair of researchers out of the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley.

As part of the study, researchers followed the working habits of 200 workers at an American tech company for eight months, noting that they worked longer hours at a faster pace on a broader range of tasks once AI was introduced.

The company didn't require the employees to use AI, but did offer subscriptions to all staff.

"In our in-progress research, we discovered that AI tools didn't reduce work, they consistently intensified it," noted associate professor of management Aruna Ranganathan and researcher Xingqi Maggie Ye, per Harvard Business Review.

They admitted that "may sound like a dream come true" for managers and corporate leadership, the researchers also warned that the changes could be "unsustainable".

After the enjoyment of experimenting with the technology fades, workers risk burnout, workload creep, cognitive strain, and even weakened decision making — all of which not only risks eating away at productivity gains but could lead to lower quality work and increased turnover.

The research comes as companies continue to wrangle with the impact of AI on their workforce, with a significant portion saying they are yet to see promised productivity gains.

Atlassian found developers were saving ten hours a week, for example, yet remained overworked due to organizational inefficiencies.

Separate research from Microsoft last year suggested the use of AI can lead to a reduction in problem solving and critical thinking, while Anthropic's own study shows AI may inhibit skills formation.

Intensification of work

The Berkeley researchers spotted three main challenges caused by work intensification: task expansion, blurred boundaries between work and home life, and increased multi-tasking.

AI enables task expansion by letting employees fill in gaps in their knowledge, enabling them to take on a wider range of work than previously possible – that included product managers writing code and researchers taking on engineering roles.

Notably, that helped staff expand their remits, which they found empowering, and benefited companies by reducing the need to bring in external help or boost headcount.

However, other workers across the enterprise felt a knock-on effect as a result. Software engineers, for example, had to review code created by AI-using colleagues who were "vibe coding" tools, which added to already-cumbersome workloads.

Beyond that, the researchers found the ease of using AI, and its tendency to be set to work in the background, meant "workers slipped small amounts of work into moments that had previously been breaks".

That included lunch, during meetings, or even in the evening after work, blurring the lines between work and rest, as well as leading to more multitasking.

"Many workers noted that they were doing more at once – and feeling more pressure – than before they used AI, even though the time savings from automation had ostensibly been meant to reduce such pressure," the researchers wrote.

To address that, the researchers advised companies to build in "intentional pauses", to ensure staff have a break, structuring work into coordinated batches to avoid constant notifications and overload, and including plenty of time for human workers to connect with their human colleagues.

Separate research suggests employees are happy to work with AI — but would rather not have the technology as a boss.

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