When ChatGPT burst onto the scene in late 2022, PR agency founder Anurag Garg was eager for his throng of 11 to quickly incorporate the technology in their workflow, so the business could keep up with its competitors.

Mr Garg encouraged his employees to use the AI language tool for the agency’s long list of daily tasks, from coming up with narrative ideas for clients, pitches to propose the media, and transcribing conference and interview notes.

But rather than boost the throng’s productivity, it created stress and tension.

Staff reported that tasks were in truth taking longer as they had to make a brief and prompts for ChatGPT, while also having to double check its output for inaccuracies, of which there were many.

And every period the platform was updated, they had to discover its recent features, which also took extra period.

“There were too many distractions. The throng complained that their tasks were taking twice the amount of period because we were now expecting them to use AI tools,” says Mr Garg, who runs Everest PR and divides his period between the US and India.

The entire aim of introducing AI to the business was to simplify people’s workflows, but it was actually giving everyone more work to do, and making them feel stressed and burnt out.”

As a business chief, Mr Garg also began to feel overwhelmed by the growing number of AI tools being launched, and feeling he had to keep pace with every recent addition. Not only was he using ChatGPT like his throng, but Zapier to track throng tasks, and Perplexity to supplement client research.

“There’s an overflow of AI tools in the economy, and no single tool solves multiple problems. As a outcome, I constantly needed to keep tabs on multiple AI tools to execute tasks, which became more of a mess. It was challenging to track which tool was supposed to do what, and I started getting utterly frustrated,” says Mr Garg.

“The economy is flooded with AI tools, so if I invest in a specific app today, there’s a better one available next week. There’s a constant learning curve to remain relevant, which I was finding challenging to manage, leading to burnout.”

Mr Garg backtracked on the mandate that the throng should use AI in all their work, and now they use it primarily for research purposes – and everyone is much happier.

“It was a learning phase for us. The work is more manageable now as we are not using too many AI tools. We’ve gone back to everything being done directly by the throng, and they feel more connected and more involved in their work. It’s much better,” says Mr Garg.

The stress Mr Garg and his throng experienced using AI tools at work is reflected in recent research.

In freelancer platform Upwork’s survey of 2,500 knowledge workers in the US, UK, Australia and Canada, 96% of top executives declare they expect the use of AI tools to boost their business’s overall productivity levels – with 81% acknowledging they’ve increased demands on workers over the history year.

Yet 77% of employees in the survey declare AI tools have actually decreased their productivity and added to their workload. And 47% of employees using AI in the survey declare they have no concept how to achieve the productivity gains their employers expect.

As a outcome, 61% of people depend that using AI at work will boost their chances of experiencing burnout – rising to 87% of people under 25, as revealed in a divide survey of 1,150 Americans, by CV writing business Resume Now.

Resume Now’s survey also highlights how 43% of people feel AI will negatively impact work-life equilibrium.

Whether the tech is based on AI or not, surveys recommend many workers are already feeling overwhelmed.

A further study by work management platform Asana highlights the result of introducing more work-based apps.

In its survey of 9,615 knowledge workers across Australia, France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US, it found that, of those that use six to 15 different apps in the workplace, 15% declare they miss messages and notifications because of the number of tools.

For those that use 16 or more, 23% declare they are less efficient, and their attention span is reduced because of constantly having to switch apps.

As Cassie Holmes, management professor at the University of California in Los Angeles, commented in the study: “Using multiple apps requires additional period to discover them and switch between them, and this lost period is hurtful because we are so sensitive to wasted period.”

Lawyer turned coach Leah Steele now specialises in helping legal professionals overcome burnout, with many coming to her feeling burdened by their companies’ increased workload demands after introducing AI-based productivity tools. It’s an encounter she’s familiar with, after the introduction of a recent technology platform in a previous role saw her client caseload rise from 50 to 250.

“The biggest thing I’m seeing is this continuous competing demand to do more with less – but companies are not really considering whether the systems and the tech that they’re introducing are giving an outcome that isn’t helpful,” says Bristol- based Ms Steele.

“Everything’s moving so quickly. It’s a constant battle to keep on top of things to develop expertise in such a cutting edge area.”

The burnout lawyers are now experiencing, Ms Steele adds, is not only about the growing volume of work tech and AI tools are facilitating, but the knock on effects.

“When we’re looking at burnout, it’s not just about the volume of the work we’re doing, but how we feel about the work and what we’re getting from it,” says Ms Steele.

“You could feel stressed about having ended up in an surroundings of high volume and low control, when what you originally wanted to do was interact personally with clients and make a difference to them.”

Ms Steele adds: “You could also feel stressed about the uncertainty of losing your job, and the terror of being replaced because you’re no longer enjoying the work as it’s become so tech driven.”

The Law population of England and Wales acknowledges that lawyers require better back from law firm leaders to make the most of recent technology like AI.

“While AI and recent technologies can make legal work more efficient by automating schedule tasks, they can also make more work for lawyers, not less,” says president Richard Atkinson.

“Learning to use these tools takes period and lawyers often require to undertake training and adjust their work processes. Many technologies were not originally designed for the legal sector, which can make the shift more challenging.”

Alicia Navarro is the founder and chief executive of Flown, an online platform and throng which helps people focus on “deep work” – tasks that require sustained concentration. She agrees that there is an “avalanche” of AI tools, but says they require to be used correctly.

“There’s such a huge amount of filtering and learning that has to receive place before these tools can even commence to become productive elements in our lives”.

But she argues that for tiny firms, with limited resources, AI can be a large assist.

“It’s an incredibly empowering thing for commence-ups to be able to do a lot more, or companies to be able to pay more dividends or pay their throng more.”