ARTIFICIAL intelligence (AI) has great potential of acting as a means to make it more convenient and enhance the ability of employees to work remotely by enhancing work-life integration.
This is because such a technology has the ability to facilitate remote working in a way that generates better productivity while lowering burnout.
Remote working was popularised by many organisations during the Covid-19 pandemic and many employees who worked remotely even until today might not necessarily be used to this kind of working style.
They are very familiar with working in an office atmosphere, integrating with team members, having meetings as well as contacting customers.
However, with the new work-from-home policy instituted by many organisations even today, the lines between personal and work life have blurred even more for professionals that were used to working from home.
In a virtual online environment, employees might be unable to project much about their psychological health to their employers.
Therefore, it becomes difficult for the employer to provide care that addresses the psychological health and well-being requirements of employees.
The concept of work-life integration is defined as a process of reconciliation of the elements of work, family as well as a self-demands of the individual.
When it comes to employees working remotely, the main effect is that work-life spillover into non-work life is reflected in the capabilities of employees to switch off at the end of the workday.
The psychological health and well-being of employees is a factor that contributes to mental burnout among online customer service representatives.
Data analytics can be used to enable the employee to focus on precise areas of customer service support which the employee should give more attention.
This can enable them to focus efforts in a more streamlined way and thus not waste their efforts and resources on other aspects of the interaction.
The aim was to lower the level of social contact between employees and customers to reduce the possibility of the Covid-19 virus being transmitted from one to another.
This is seen as a way for many organisations to maintain competitiveness and also secure the health and well-being of their employees.
AI-based credible neural networks are regarded as one of the most used algorithms in the process of deep learning presently.
It is starting to gain a lot of attention in the business world and the application is premised on the problems that are intended to be solved by those using it.
A neural network is regarded as a computational system that comprises a large number of very approximately connected elements.
It attempts to model the biological system architecture. It also aims to process natural neural networks.
The neural network can be regarded as a very sophisticated facet of modern computing technology.
The role of the credible neural network in assisting customer service executives online is quite apparent.
Certain organisations have only started to use chatbots, including automated customer support assistance systems, and these are starting to alleviate the pressure on customer service employees working remotely.
What organisations need is a system that can complement the customer service representative that is working online remotely so that the neural network system can assume a certain number of tasks and duties, and this can have the effect of relieving a certain amount of pressure on the part of the employee.
At the same time, it will give the customer the impression that the organisation is willing to assist them to the best of their abilities and thereby also enhance customer experience.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, there was a significant increase in the adoption of AI and credible neural networks, particularly in the sphere of customer service.
Many organisations have benefited from the presence of such networks complementing customer service representatives in an online environment.
Credible neural networks seem to possess an AI ability to predict premised on consumer data and this is regarded as ideal for omnichannel services.
This is capable of producing a high level of consistency and seamlessness of experience.
Nonetheless, there are drawbacks to using such neural networks, one of which is that correct information must be inputted into the AI system for it to function properly.
It is a well-established fact that mentally burnt-out customer service representatives are the ones who are most likely to exhibit workplace deviance, thus, affecting job performance negatively.
However, artificial intelligence-based credible neural networks show a significant opportunity to address this problem by providing employees working remotely with greater efficiency, support and convenience.
Such a system can help employees overcome significant challenges associated with working remotely for long hours.
AI-based credible neural networks can provide the solution for many organisations which are experiencing the problem of employee burnout.
Such technology would almost certainly improve both employee and organisational productivity.
Associate Professor Dr Akram Al-Khaled is head of the MBA programme at the Faculty of Business at Berjaya University College. Comments: letters@thesundaily.com
