BambooHR, the People Intelligence Platform for small and mid-sized businesses, has released Redesigning Work: AI's Performance Review, a new study finding that workers spend the equivalent of 47 work days a year using AI on average, but roughly 20 of those days are lost to troubleshooting errors and prompt iteration rather than productive output. Despite the time spent correcting mistakes, 65% of workers still feel confident and enthusiastic about using AI at work, and 58% say time savings is their main motivation for using it.

The findings are based on a survey of more than 1,600 full-time, salaried US workers, including a subgroup of 520 HR professionals. The research also found that AI adoption is outpacing most organizations' ability to manage its costs, with 63% of organizations already raising their AI tool budgets in response to employee usage, without clear evidence the investment is paying off.

Where the Time Actually Goes

Workers spend 87 minutes a day using AI on average, equal to roughly 47 eight-hour workdays each year. Of that time, 42% goes to troubleshooting errors and iterating on prompts, while just 35% goes to productive work that furthers an employee's workload. The gap adds up to about 20 full workdays a year spent simply getting AI to work correctly. Usage also skews toward the top of the org chart: VPs and C-suite executives spend 101 minutes per day with AI, more than managers and directors (89 minutes) and nearly twice as much as individual contributors (54 minutes).

A Reputation Problem That Isn't Slowing Adoption

Negative AI coverage is shaping how workers feel, but not how they act. 86% of workers say recent AI news, including coverage of data centers, environmental effects, and job impacts, has affected their mindset, and 70% say news about AI's environmental impact specifically has shifted their personal feelings. Yet that sentiment isn't translating into behavior: while one-third of workers report hesitations about using AI tools, only 3% have actually refused to use them.

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Where Guardrails Are Falling Behind

As AI takes on roles once reserved for people, oversight is lagging. 35% of workers say knowledge transfer at their organization now runs primarily through AI tools rather than human guidance, yet over half of organizations (54%) lack a clear, documented AI usage policy that's consistently communicated. The line between personal and company AI use is also blurring: 59% of workers use personal AI accounts for work tasks, and among that group, 71% have entered client data, proprietary strategy, or other sensitive company information into tools their employer cannot see.

A trust gap shows up in hiring, too. While 67% of HR professionals said they would trust AI to conduct a candidate interview on its own, just 34% of employees agreed, a gap made more notable by the fact that 80% of HR professionals admit to finding bias problems in the AI tools they use for hiring, including 33% who've observed demographic bias specifically.