Northern employers hesitant about generative AI, shows new CIPD report

With skills shortages persisting across the North of England, organisations are increasingly turning to technology, by introducing or increasing automation, to help plug the gap. However, 31% of northern employers see privacy and security concerns as potential drawbacks to the use of generative AI.
This research comes from the CIPD’s latest Labour Market Outlook survey which also revealed that 10% of northern employers have banned the use of generative AI, which can help to automate manual tasks and processes.

In response, the CIPD, the professional body for HR and people development, has urged employers to look at the benefits of AI or risk being outpaced by technology.
A third (33%) of northern employers see increased productivity and efficiency as potential organisational benefits of using generative AI with a similar level (29%) seeing cost savings as an organisational benefit.

However, employers in the north are less likely to have any formal policies or guidance on generative AI (7%), compared to 16% of employers across the UK.

Daphne Doody-Green, Head of CIPD in Northern England said:
“Our research suggests that many employers are still hesitant to introduce AI in the workplace. This may be because they are unaware, or unsure, of what technology could be beneficial to their people and wider organisation.

“But AI is accelerating fast, so now is the time for organisations to learn, experiment and innovate, to understand the potential benefits to their people, jobs, and business outcomes, but also to understand and mitigate the risks.

“Employers who are not proactive will soon find themselves outpaced by developments as this technology will continue to progress and reach into new areas of our working lives.”

The CIPD’s Labour Market Outlook is a quarterly survey of more than 2,000 employers across the UK on their pay, hiring and redundancy intentions. This quarter’s report, which includes a sample of almost 300 northern employers, also found that:

• Expected redundancies are lower in the North, with 10% of employers expecting to make some redundancies in the three months to December 2023, compared to 17% across all UK employers.
•  Basic pay for public sector workers in the UK is expected to increase at the same rate as private sector workers for the first time since early 2021 – both standing at 5%.
•  Forty-one per cent of UK employers have hard-to-fill vacancies. However, there’s a marked difference across sectors. More than half (51%) of public-sector employers report hard-to-fill vacancies, compared to 38% of private-sector employers.
•  Employment intentions remain positive across all industries, with seven in ten (69%) employers planning to recruit in the next three months, rising to 85% in the public sector.