May 29, 2026
37% of Employees Now Turn to AI for Companionship at Work
More than a third of employees now use AI for companionship at work, according to new research published in Workday’s Human Connection Workplace Index. The Index, which surveyed 2,150 full-time employees actively using AI across seven countries, points to a growing ‘connection deficit’ fuelled by AI adoption.
A similar proportion (33%) of employees rarely or never have workplace conversations that go beyond transactional work tasks in a given week. Fewer than half find it easy to make friends at work. And 14% of respondents had taken time off in the past year due to loneliness or social isolation. Among Gen Z workers, that figure rises to one in five.
Gen Z is also 12 times more likely than Gen X to report feeling completely disconnected from colleagues, and twice as likely as millennials to feel lonely at work. More than one in five Gen Z employees also say AI tools have made their personal relationships with colleagues worse. The generational gap is stark.
Less Patience for Small Talk
Part of what is driving this is a subtle but meaningful shift in how people are choosing to interact. Since adopting AI tools, 16% of respondents say they now have less patience for small talk.
Among the 37% who use AI for companionship, many cite the technology’s ‘always-available’, ‘judgement-free’ nature as the reason they choose it over a colleague. People are less willing to deal with the potential friction that human interaction can bring. As a result, the informal interactions that once threaded through the working day – and built strong bonds among coworkers – are falling away.
“Our Index cautions that, as we route more questions, ideas, and even conflicts through AI, we risk losing the everyday human interactions that build trust, resilience, and a sense of connection,” says Carrie Varoquiers, chief impact officer at Workday.
Productivity Gains and Reduced Burnout
Alongside the connection deficit, the Index also surfaced more positive findings from increased AI use. 62% of employees say their stress or burnout risk has decreased since they started using AI, and 86% report feeling more productive.
After years of burnout dominating the EX conversation, those numbers may appear as welcome news. Employees using AI tools are reportedly doing higher-value work, feeling less overwhelmed, and feeling more confident in their ability to succeed in future roles – 64% say AI has increased that confidence.
However, the findings also suggest organisations are swapping one problem out for another – disconnection – which is more difficult to measure. Tracking workload, stress, and productivity is not easy. But organisations are far less equipped to track the slow erosion of informal connection. Research shows a link between loneliness and emotional suppression, suggesting that disconnected employees are less likely to voice how they feel – so the problem is less likely to surface on pulse surveys, anonymous feedback, or in one-to-ones with managers.
The Confidence and Burnout Counter-Signals
The picture on worker confidence is complicated further by data from elsewhere. ManpowerGroup’s 2026 Global Talent Barometer, which surveyed over 13,000 workers across 19 countries, found that while AI usage rose 13% in 2025, confidence in using the technology fell 18% over the same period. UK research from Ipsos Karian & Box identifies a psychological barrier to AI adoption, with only 38% of employees feeling confident they would be supported, rather than penalised, for missing an AI error.
Conflicting data also surfaces around AI’s impact on burnout. In a 2026 survey conducted by Modern Health, 67% of respondents said AI has increased productivity expectations – and of those employees, 64% report increased stress directly tied to those expectations. This is increasingly referred to as ‘AI workload creep’: a phenomenon where the time-saving benefits of AI tools lead to higher volumes of work and cognitive fatigue, rather than reduced workload.
This complicated picture underscores the importance for organisations to interrogate their own people about AI’s impact on burnout, confidence, productivity, and connection. With AI advancing rapidly, and organisations grappling with its effects at different speeds, employees’ responses will be unique to the business they work in.
Why This Matters for Customer Experience
Conflicting data aside, the connection deficit findings carry a clear warning for customer service quality. The empathy, patience, and relational intelligence that frontline workers bring to customer interactions are developed, in part, through relationship-building with colleagues. Customer-facing employees who turn away from coworkers towards AI for companionship will not be practicing the skills – small talk, conflict management, and reading emotional cues – that are so important in CX.
Adding more training to counteract this problem is unlikely to help much. Relational skills require human interaction to develop fully, and that deficit will be felt most acutely by those with the least experience to draw on.
Gen Z workers are more at risk than older generations of losing these relationship-building moments, yet they still expect emotional intelligence and human connection when navigating complex customer service interactions, according to a Five9 survey. The gap between what they can offer and what they want as customers is widening.
What Organisations Should Be Measuring Now
Human connection is considerably hard to track. But the Workday Index offers a starting point: are employees having non-transactional conversations? Do they have meaningful relationships at work? Are they turning to AI because colleagues feel less available, or more effortful to engage with?
Asking these questions now, and addressing any early warning signs of disconnection, is far less costly than waiting for the problem to show up in attrition data or customer satisfaction scores.
