Talking about AI elicits two reactions: glazed-over eyes or an eager, all-in expression. AI has the capacity for good. But most of us aren't seeing what that could mean because the hype around AI right now feels designed to extract more than it gives. Being curious, I wanted to see what the data said, and it’s staggering.
77% of Americans don't trust businesses or government to use AI responsibly, only 5% trust AI "a lot," while 41% actively distrust it. And trust is declining.
The US has the lowest regard for AI of any country in the world.
And now Harvard Business Review just named what's happening inside organizations: "AI brain fry." 1 in 7 workers report it. Mental fog. Difficulty focusing. Slower decisions. 39% more major errors.
This is indicative of a serious erosion of trust, and you only need to turn to the media headlines to understand why.
People aren’t seeing AI as beneficial to advancing humanity. And those attitudes don’t stop at the door when they come into the workplace. So organizations are facing a collision of leaders pushing AI while people are becoming more burnt out and mistrustful of the AI hype.
But the most interesting part of this story is that people are actually using AI personally. This shows they are not resistant to AI, but to the idea that it should be used to extract more than it gives at the societal level. 99% of Americans use at least one AI-enabled product weekly, but 64% don't realize it.
The story is clear. The workforce isn't resistant to AI. They're exhausted by the performance of it.
They are seeing leaders promote extraction over elevation and are resisting that messaging. Organizations must learn to meet the workforce where they are because AI scaling is not simply an organizational change; it’s a societal change and one that everyone is living as an experiment in real-time, with no one knowing where things will end.
So yes, America is experiencing AI burnout, and those attitudes show up in our organizations. The organizations that will be standing 5 years from now will have learned that they can both adopt AI responsibly and respect that AI isn’t just another tech tool but one shaping society forever.
People aren't afraid of AI. Many use it every day. They're afraid of what's being done to them with it, and there's a difference. Until leaders understand that difference, every AI adoption strategy they build will fail.