University at Buffalo School of Management

Autumn 2024 Buffalo Business 9 returned those results — did the AI decisions result in us bringing in candidates we shouldn't have, or did it reject candidates we should've interviewed?" In the School of Management, faculty have been studying the impact of AI in the workplace. One researcher, Kate Bezrukova, chair and associate professor of organi- zation and human resources, first became involved with AI in 2014 through grant writing for NASA, where she saw interest in learning how AI machine learning applies to humans. In 2023, she published a study exploring factors that increase adoption of AI in teams and found that getting employees to use AI depends on two factors: employee atti- tudes toward the technology and the degree to which they can choose to work with it. "The answer to the question about people collabo- rating with AI is more nuanced than simply, 'Will they or won't they?'" says Bezrukova. "Managers should be aware of a variety of responses when AI is introduced into the workplace." Bezrukova sees AI making sweeping changes on the job market, but maybe not in the way experts originally thought. "Five years ago, we were think- ing that transportation and manual labor jobs would be the first to go because intelligent machines and robotics were pretty much at the point of taking over," she says. "Now, with AI, we've seen that white collar jobs like computer science are also being impacted — not necessarily in a bad way — but how we work will be changing. I'm an optimist, I think it will be changing for more accurate, more efficient solutions." According to a recent Forbes survey, almost all busi- ness owners believe ChatGPT will help their business, and nearly two-thirds believe AI will improve customer rela- tionships. Meanwhile, automation is beginning to replace workers at fast-food restaurants and grocery stores. And in Hollywood, writers and actors went on strike last year, demanding safeguards against AI. Artificial intelligence is already affecting every aspect of business, from accounting and finance, to marketing, supply chains, HR and more — and its impact is growing every day. In the School of Management, faculty are conducting research to deepen our understanding of AI and how we can use it to change society for the better. Meanwhile, in workplaces around the world, alumni are at the forefront, putting this rapidly changing technology to work. The future is here At a conference presenta- tion in Hong Kong in 2018, Jasmeet Singh Gujral, MS '12, predicted that "the future of AI will be conversa- tional" — long before ChatGPT hit the market. That prediction was spot on, especially for Gujral, who graduated from the School of Management with a Master of Science in management informa- tion systems. He's now a product manager at eBay, where he leads the company's efforts in using conversational AI to meet the support needs of its customers. "Whenever customers need help, they get access to our Help Hub," he says. "There, they have the option to interact with an AI-driven bot that is trained to understand and respond to customers' intents in the most personalized and conversational way possible." Gujral says developing AI for customer service involves creating complex conversational flows and making sure the system understands and responds appropriately to customer needs. But much like in HR, in customer service there's only so much AI can do. So it's critical to have AI that can recognize its own limitations and hand the discussion over to humans when needed. "The AI needs to figure out who the best human agent is to serve the customer, and to empower that agent with the right data and the right insights in real time from the conversation the AI has had with the customer," says Gujral. Bezrukova Gujral Photo: Debbie Oberg Brothman With AI, we've seen that white collar jobs likes computer science are also being impacted — not necessar- ily in a bad way — but how we work will be changing. KATE BEZRUKOVA Chair and Associate Professor Organization and Human Resources

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