New data on work abounds, but your time is limited. Charter head of research Emily Goligoski examines dozens of industry and academic studies about how we work now and synthesize what is most actionable for your workforce. Find more Charter research here.

In a recent interview with one of Charter’s subscribers, an operations lead-turned-entrepreneur, about how she makes sense of the changing world of work, she told us that she has been struggling to understand “who has the power now.” Is it workers? Leaders? Shareholders?

There isn’t any easy answer to the question of who has decision-making power today. (Alas!) But having insight into the areas of greatest disagreement can help predict where difficulties could arise in your workplace, and help avoid them. To understand the current state of the evolving power dynamic between employers and employees, we focused on four key areas where new research finds notable disconnects in executive and worker perceptions: employee trust, optimism around artificial intelligence, work locations, and productivity.

A few highlights: Double the number of executives expect AI to have a positive impact on the overall employee experience, two-thirds, compared to one-third of individual contributors. Another one in three ICs predict that AI will negatively impact their experiences, according to Qualtrics, concerns that might be mitigated with smart employer planning.

While we focus on research from the last few months, these disconnects have precedent in the productivity paranoia that Microsoft named last year. Like that phenomenon, which found a lack of leader confidence that employees working remotely were being productive, naming these points of difference and addressing them now can halt worsening gaps.

đź“‹ The data point

Sources: PricewaterhouseCoopers’ 2023 Trust Survey; Qualtrics AI research; Axios analysis of WFH Research data; Slack State of Work 2023 report

Our take

Employees and employers don’t occupy different planets, despite what these indicators might suggest. While it’s crucial for organizations to understand and face these disconnects, we also see two key areas where workers and their bosses are aligned right now:

  • They’re time-constrained. A similar number of employees (64%) and leaders (60%) are struggling to prioritize and complete their work, according to Microsoft's latest trend index. Across both groups of survey respondents, the company found that “Everything feels important, so we spend our workdays trying to get out of the red.”
  • They’re concerned about staff skills gaps around AI: According to a May study by Salesforce, nearly two in three workers say they don’t have the skills to effectively and safely use generative AI. This is reflected by senior leadership: Some 70% don’t see the needed skills on their teams. AI upskilling provides an opportunity for widespread training, and we suggest avoiding a common trap in learning and development programs, which is senior leaders having access to more and more flexible training.

What to read

Key takeaways:

Having insight into the areas of greatest disagreement can help predict where difficulties could arise in your workplace, and help avoid them. To understand the current state of the evolving power dynamic between employers and employees, we focused on four key areas where new research finds notable disconnects in executive and worker perceptions: employee trust, optimism around artificial intelligence, work locations, and productivity.