{"id":81197,"date":"2025-08-19T12:37:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-19T12:37:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/81197\/"},"modified":"2025-08-19T12:37:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T12:37:07","slug":"using-ai-at-work-be-open-and-honest-about-it-experts-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/81197\/","title":{"rendered":"Using AI at work? Be open and honest about it, experts say"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

If companies want their staff to use AI, they need to teach them how to use the technology effectively, HR experts advise. And if you are using AI at work, let your boss and colleagues know.Getty Images<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re using artificial intelligence at your job, how important is it to get real about it with your boss and your workmates?<\/p>\n

\u201cYou should absolutely be open about it,\u201d says Sachi Kittur, vice-president of human experience and innovation at the Human Resources Professionals Association, which oversees 24,000 HR professionals and students in Ontario. <\/p>\n

Disclosure gets complicated quickly, though. \u201cThere\u2019s a problem at a lot of companies because the companies have not evolved their practices to encourage their employees to be open about using AI, or even to help make sure they\u2019re using it effectively,\u201d Ms. Kittur says.<\/p>\n

She points to a report released in June 2025 by KPMG Canada<\/a> which found that 61 per cent of Canadian workers surveyed say they use AI at work, but 56 per cent say that relying too much on the technology has resulted in errors, unchecked outputs and people putting less effort into their work. <\/p>\n

The problems with AI disclosure come from lack of understanding and uncertainty among both workers and bosses about what AI rules should be and a lingering fear of where AI is taking us, Ms. Kittur says.<\/p>\n

\u201cAI is the new way of working smarter. People who are using it should not be hiding. But workplaces need to build a culture of trust about AI,\u201d she explains. <\/p>\n

\u201cWithout being open about AI, people will keep it from their managers that they\u2019re using it because they\u2019re afraid it\u2019s going to make them look bad. It\u2019s up to managers and leaders to show their employees and associates when AI helps make work better and more efficient,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt does matter whether you say that you\u2019re using AI at work, but there\u2019s no hard and fast rule about when and how,\u201d says Ally MacLellan, director of integrated intelligence and technology at Proof Strategies, a communications firm. Ms. MacLellan also teaches courses about deploying AI for Meltwater Academy, which runs education programs for corporate and institutional clients. <\/p>\n

\u201cAI in the workplace is changing so fast that rather than developing rigid rules, we\u2019ve come up with guidelines. You need some flexibility. For example, some of the companies we work with say they absolutely don\u2019t want anyone to use AI, but we point out that everyone already uses spellcheck, which is a crude form of AI,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a matter of degree and context how much anyone should disclose about their AI use, she says. \u201cIf you\u2019re using AI to lightly edit and clean up an email it\u2019s probably okay not to mention it. But if you\u2019re using, say, an AI platform to develop a storyboard for a presentation, then you should probably disclose this,\u201d Ms. MacLellan says. <\/p>\n

In the latter case, workers should think of this kind of advanced AI as a work colleague, she suggests. \u201cIf somebody helped you prepare the work, you\u2019d give them credit. In this case the somebody is AI.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe tell the people in our courses to take a \u2018hamburger\u2019 approach. The AI work can be the hamburger in the middle, but you need human input on either side, like a bun and all the fixings,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n

Pamela Lirio, a professor of digital HR at the Universit\u00e9 de Montr\u00e9al, says \u201cdisclosure rules and policies are still in the Wild West era in Canada.\u201d However there are some regulations, such as legislation passed in Ontario last year <\/a> that now requires employers to disclose whether they used AI to screen, select and assess job applicants. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut in most cases it\u2019s still vague. The employee may be waiting for guidance from the boss and the boss may be waiting for the employee to speak up,\u201d she adds. \u201cAnother problem is that there are so many types and degrees of AI use, and it\u2019s changing constantly. We\u2019re still trying to figure out the guardrails for student and academic work in universities.\u201d <\/p>\n

Adam Froman, founder and chief executive officer of Delvinia, a digital research firm, says, \u201cyou should be upfront about your AI use 100 per cent of the time. But using it for small tasks can be an exception.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you are using it to look for data or to do an outline, you probably don\u2019t need to disclose that you used AI unless someone asks you,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut if you are using it in a way that may lead someone to ask about how you did the work, then you should be up front. You can present the work as your own, but you should disclose that you used AI to help,\u201d Mr. Froman says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reality is that AI is going to continue to change the way we work,\u201d says Scott Taber, vice-president at Media Profile, a Toronto-headquartered communications firm. \u201cYou need to create an environment where staff can speak openly. Trust, strategy, creativity and relationships will always require human input,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: If companies want their staff to use AI, they need to teach them…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81198,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[62,276,277,49,48,43012,61],"class_list":["post-81197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-ordid3813001372te","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}