Australia stands at a pivot point.

The country’s productivity is lagging and the causes are complex. Legacy systems, skills gaps, and structural inefficiencies are all contributing factors – as are new and emerging technologies that require fresh ways of working.

Now is the time to create a national vision for how businesses drive productivity, and it all starts with creating a symbiotic link between employees and Artificial Intelligence.

There can be no doubt that productivity in Australia has stalled.

A report from the Reserve Bank of Australia in August stated that ‘a decline in business dynamism and slower technological diffusion in the economy’ has been a driving factor in declining productivity and that ‘slower productivity growth has directly weighed on growth in wages, incomes, and household spending’.

At the same time, we’re seeing a growing understanding within the community of the need to take hold of the potential afforded by new technology generative Artificial Intelligence (AI).

In June of this year, a Datacom/YouGov poll found that 89 per cent of those surveyed believe that adopting new technology is important for improving Australia’s productivity, and 73 per cent believe AI will help them do their jobs more easily.

Worryingly, the same survey found that just 42 per cent of Australians consider themselves highly tech-literate and 71 per cent said they would like to improve their tech literacy.

Contrary to concerns expressed by some sectors of the community, the rapid use of AI in the workplace does not replace the need for human involvement.

Nor will this type of symbiotic approach replace the essential creativity and innovation necessary to drive productivity – this will always require the implacable dynamism of the human brain.

A more rapid blending of the interaction between AI and human employees in the workplace will allow people to do their job better.

It will involve utilising AI to automate the mundane, routine, and time-consuming tasks, allowing workers to focus on more strategic and value-adding work.

This new hybrid workplace dynamic that uses AI-driven automation to responsibly and effectively increase the output of human workers will optimise the capabilities of both humans and machines, boosting overall productivity.

It’s already happening in other advanced economies.

OpenAI and the US government recently announced the ‘Stargate Initiative’ which aims to spend $500 billion – more than the Apollo Space program – to build as many as ten new AI datacentres to drive a new age of US public and private sector workplace productivity.

Australia cannot afford to be left behind.

However, this new vision of human-AI collaboration to boost productivity will not happen without direct action from government.

One of the most important levers available to government to drive more rapid adoption of AI in the wider business community is incentivisation. This could include grants, subsidies and tax breaks such as instant asset write-offs for AI investment.

Utilising the buying power of government through public sector procurement and implementation of generative AI will also be an important factor. By establishing itself as an early adopter, government can better foster greater economy-wide demand for AI systems.

Also essential is a regulatory framework that encourages greater investment and adoption of generative AI. As recommended by the Productivity Commission, a ‘lighter touch’ approach to AI regulation while meeting public expectations around trust and transparency will help attract the necessary capital to our shores to increase AI adoption by business.

The opportunities to build productivity with new generative AI are very real.

With the right government policy settings, a new human-AI workplace vision could help drive productivity gains for our nation now, and well into the future.

Laura Malcolm is an AI professional and Managing Director at Datacom Australia