Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox: AI Is Giving Workers Time Back

AI was supposed to lighten the workday. Instead, the people who use it most say they are busier than ever. Jabra's WorkLife report, released October 13, gives the effect a name: the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox. The more AI takes on, the more work employees say they have.

The workload keeps growing

The study, formally titled "WorkLife 2026: The New Shape of Work", is based on a Toluna survey run in May of more than six thousand knowledge workers across six markets: France, Germany, India, Poland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It tracks close to two hundred variables on how AI is changing the workday, how organizations are responding, and which workers are thriving. The full report is available on Jabra's thought leadership page.

Across every type of work the survey measured, employees said their workload grew over the past year. About 85% report more work in at least one area. Strategic planning and analysis rose the most, with 51% of workers spending more time on each than they did a year ago, followed by creative work at 50% and administrative tasks at 49%. Rather than shrinking the job, AI is broadening it. That mismatch between expectation and reality sits at the center of the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox, and it echoes recent predictions that AI will shrink the workweek: the technology keeps changing the job without reducing it.

AI users collaborate more, not less

The report also challenges the assumption that AI isolates workers. Forty-two percent of employees say they collaborate more than they did a year ago, compared with 13% who say they collaborate less. The heaviest AI users are the most social: 64% of them say they work with colleagues more than a year ago, versus 25% of workers who use AI less often, another facet of the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox. As AI absorbs individual tasks, meetings have become the place for work that still needs a human, according to the report. Four in ten employees say most of their meeting time goes to problem-solving, and nearly as many say it goes to making decisions.

Who thrives, and who gets left behind

Not everyone feels the shift. Thirty-two percent of workers say their work changed little or not at all over the past year, and that group reports some of the lowest satisfaction, preparedness, and career optimism in the study. At the other end are the so-called AI Superusers, about 15% of the workforce, who have woven AI into daily work with strong support from their organizations. They report some of the highest satisfaction and career optimism. That split is the other half of the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox: the tools widen the gap between workers set up to use them and workers left to figure them out alone.

The divide shows up clearly by rank. Eighteen percent of non-managers say their work changed significantly or fundamentally over the past year, compared with 47% of senior leaders. Thirty percent of senior leaders describe themselves as heavy AI users, versus 8% of non-managers, and four in ten non-managers use AI monthly or less, against 14% of top management. Training follows the same pattern: 64% of non-managers got no AI training or only a brief introduction, compared with 26% of senior leaders, and just 39% of trained non-managers called it very or extremely relevant to their role, versus 76% of senior leaders. Until that gap closes, the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox will keep landing hardest on the workers with the least support.

The manager makes the difference

Direct support from a manager matters as much as access to the tools. Employees whose managers can genuinely help with AI are 2.4 times more likely to use it daily, with 65% doing so versus 27% of those without that support, yet half of all workers do not describe their manager as capable of supporting them with AI. That fits the AI activation gap found in a recent Cognizant study, where workers wanted to use AI more than their jobs allowed. Career optimism splits sharply too: those with a capable manager rate it 8.3 out of 10, compared with 5.5 for those without one. According to Calum MacDougall, Jabra's president, the companies that come out ahead will be the ones that win at deployment, and that depends on leaders listening to what their teams need to work productively with AI.

Workers are starting to talk to AI

How workers use the technology is changing as well. People are moving past typed prompts and talking through ideas, problems, and delegated tasks out loud instead. Workers who regularly speak to AI are 24% less likely to associate work with stress and 23% less likely to report exhaustion, the study found. They are also 37% more likely to say their job feels secure than people who mainly type. For a generation that already talks to colleagues all day, talking through work with an AI partner may become the next normal part of the job. One caution from earlier research still applies: short bursts of AI assistance can erode persistence, which is why the Jabra WorkLife productivity paradox rewards workers who stay in the loop instead of checking out.