AI Is Writing Performance Reviews. What Could Go Wrong?

JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s decision to let managers use artificial intelligence to help write performance reviews stands to bring relief to one of bosses’ most dreaded annual tasks. It also raises questions as to whether bot-written reviews will make the process better or worse, especially for employees seeking meaningful feedback.

Bringing AI into annual assessments can save managers time, and even result in more useful feedback than employees get from human bosses alone, executives and management experts say. Yet they caution that outsourcing too much could turn reviews into AI workslop. (At any rate, bot-written reviews are already out there whether employers bless them or not, with many managers making up their own rules.)

“The boundaries are going to be redrawn with this technology shift,” said Benjamin Levick, who leads internal AI and operations at corporate card company Ramp. “I don’t know if they’ll be full-blown uncomfortable or feel dehumanizing. There’s of course a risk of that if you’re very clunky with how you utilize AI, but I do think that there's a way to thread the needle of infusing AI in more managerial practices.”