Name: Beyond the Diploma: Preparing Students for a Workforce in Flux
Uploaded: 2025-07-22T17:46:28.340Z
Duration: 26 min 4 s
Description: Beyond the Diploma: Preparing Students for a Workforce in Flux

Transcript for "Beyond the Diploma: Preparing Students for a Workforce in Flux": and welcome to today's event, Beyond the Diploma, Preparing Students for a Workforce in Flux. Joining me today for this important conversation is Abby Lenny, the managing director from the Harris Poll, and I am Jenny Maxwell, the head of Grammarly for Education. Hi, Abby. How are you today? Hi, Jenny. I'm great. I'm so excited to be here talking about AI and education. I am equally excited. We have the pleasure of having this conversation together a few months ago at the ASU GSV event in San Diego, and we had so much, success with the event. We've had lots of requests to continue the conversation, so I'm very grateful for you joining us again today. But even in the last several months, there's been even more, headlines around how AI is really shaping the job market, and there's some even predictions about what the new recent graduation graduating class is gonna be expecting in this world of work. The New York Times is reporting that, there will be a potential job apocalypse with AI displacing all entry level positions. Anthropic CEO, which we all know is, they're building an incredible LLM, claims that AI is gonna automate up to 50% of all entry level white collar jobs. And several high profile companies have released memos requiring hiring managers to prove that AI cannot perform the job, of a human before they open up the role. So, lots of happened in the in the last couple months, and these have headlines really reinforce what everyone on this call already knows to be true. Career readiness is a top priority for institutions. And today, that's just getting more and more complex and competitive with AI. Right? What that readiness really means is completely influx. So today, we're gonna share what we know about the modern workplace with the goal of enabling all of you to better understand what is happening today presently and prepare your students for the future. Using, our data from Grammarly's 2025 annual report, we're gonna share insights into what the current knowledge workforce looks like and what that means for students, faculty, and administrators. First, we'll describe the current state of overload in the modern workplace. And as working professionals, many of these emerging themes will probably resonate with you. I know they do with me. Second, we're going to explore how AI is changing the landscape of the world of work. We're gonna focus specifically how a segment of the workforce is thriving amid this overload. I can't wait to hear. And spoiler alert, these are the professionals who deem themselves AI fluent, these first movers. Business leaders are increasingly turning to them for help in adopting AI across their entire organization, which creates really interesting learnings for higher ed as we know now have a practical road map for the skills that students need to enter and be successful right away in their career. And And this will take us to our final section, which is we're gonna dive into exactly what AI fluent professionals are doing and what that means for both faculty and students. So professionals are literally spending their entire time at work communicating in one way or or another, almost thirty nine hours, literally an entire weeks of work communicating. Thirty of those hours are spent on written and in tool communication. We're describing, written communication as what we do in documents and email and basically communication channels. In tool communication is written communication in the workplace productivity suite and collaboration tools. Okay. So what? Professionals across sectors are spending so much of their time communicating, that means less time is actually being spent being productive. Hopefully, we will all leave the session with some, some solutions and optimism for addressing that dynamic. But first, I'm gonna turn it over to Abby to ground us in what the data is actually telling us. Abby. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Jenny. So just before we dive into the findings, I wanna give a quick refresher of the methodology of the study. Similar to the last few years, we spoke to about 1,250 professionals, including a mix of knowledge workers and business leaders. So, they're all employed at relatively large companies and the business leaders are working at a more senior level whereas the knowledge workers are more at the, associate entry level of work. We also are gonna be talking about a few different groups of AI users in the study. And just to give you some definitions, those who are AI avoidant are those who are not interacting with AI at work at all. There are the AI familiar who might dabble here and there but aren't really leaning in. There are the AI literate who use AI comfortably in their day to day and the AI fluent who are really advanced and driving, interesting new applications and progress in the space. So what did we learn this year? We saw four key trends that came out of our state of productivity work with Grammarly this year. And the first one I wanna talk about is one that probably feels really familiar to everyone, this idea around communication inflation. Right? We have seen that consistently every year we've run this study, communication has increased across every channel in terms of volume. In fact, it's up 11% from last year and which was up, like, again from the year before. And what's interesting is as the rate of communication is accelerating, the quality and productivity of that communication is not keeping pace. And so what this creates is an even greater volume of miscommunication. And there is this need then for communication inflation to remediate that. So we need to communicate more to account for the increased miscommunication that's happening in the workplace. The second major trend that we saw from the research this year is a term we're coining as performative productivity. And what this refers to is the idea of engaging in task to create the impression of impression of productivity as opposed to delivering tangible outcomes. So this could be joining a meeting and saying something because you feel like you have to for optics rather than because you have something to say. This could be spending your time on a task that's deemed irrelevant or not useful, you know, hours or days later. And what's alarming about this performative productivity is that our data shows that it occupies about 21% of people's work week or one full working day a week that is tied to this performative productivity. And the business leaders we spoke to gave us a sense that there could be two things driving this. The first is a lack of psychological safety in organizations where people might not feel comfortable saying, you know, opting out of something because they feel it's not directly relevant to them or they they have to go along with the optics for political reasons in the organization. Second is, the use of out of task based tools rather than outcome oriented mindset. And employees are required to work in ways that align with these technologies, which isn't actually conducive to how work actually gets done. The third trend that we saw in this year's research is perpetual connectivity. And, again, this is another that I'm sure is very familiar to everyone. We've all felt this state of always on work. I know just, recently, Microsoft released a piece on the infinite work day showing how their team's data shows that people are never logging off. And, in fact, like meetings and chats after hours and on weekends have only increased in the last year. And with the combination of communication tools, the volume, the never ending nature of it, people feel like they have to be responsive at all hours of the day. And this is positive in the sense that it's enabled a lot of collaboration. However, it has also accelerated distraction, burnout, stress. Two thirds of professionals that we spoke to say that the expectation to always be connected contributes to their burnout and stress levels. And this is really important as we think about these sort of Gen z college students entering the workforce and finding ways to protect their mental health. Lastly, the the fourth big trend that we saw in this year's research is this idea of AI avoidance. And what we see is that in our data, about 22% of the workforce classify themselves as as purely AI avoidant. They don't use it at all. While another 39% say that they're familiar and they dabble here and there, but they're not heavy users. So that's a majority of the workforce that that are not leaning into AI as fully as they could be. And this has interesting implications because we see that those who are reporting lower levels of AI fluency or higher levels of AI avoidance are, reporting lower levels of productivity. They're more they're less effective in their jobs. They have a more pessimistic view of AI. And something that's a little bit, counterintuitive is that actually Gen z is just as AI avoidant as other generations. There might be a misconception that these are young people who are digitally native, but they still don't feel comfortable knowing when and how to leverage AI in the workplace enough to implement it in a way that boosts their productivity. So I'm curious, Jenny, what what you have seen, in terms of this AI avoidance trend. I find it fascinating, because, you know, the implication is that if that you are young and you have some level of technology sophistication that you can bring that energy into your workplace the way that we've seen, in other technology trends. I think if you think about students today, leaving their collegiate experience with a ton of ambiguity about when they can use AI, how to lean in, when to completely avoid it, and it and and in many cases, it is so, this ambiguity is so systemic. They can go from one professor to the next and have completely different policy around that. So I'm not at all shocked that they feel like they don't know when and how to lean in. And the avoidance is the one maybe, emotional security path that they will, that they will choose to follow, so I'm not at all surprised. But as a business leader, I've been digging into Grammarly's data as well as third party research. And depending on what research you look at, the the there these two stories exist, right, where these employees fear that AI is gonna displace them, or AI is creating a lot more friction or that it will somehow, show that they don't understand a certain topic. Like, there's some of this, like, lack of fluency and and and confidence with it in one path. The other path being employees that see AI as the overall assistant in their work life and knowing it's gonna elevate them, in terms of their effectiveness, their productivity, all of the things. And it's like, narrow the two shall cross, and both are valid. Right? I understand how we got here. But when we look at the usage rates across these both both of these views, usually those who fear the AI, they've not really used it or they've used it very superficially in a very specific use case. And while those who see it as an exciting new tool are the ones who are these avid users, and so they go all in and they're really trying to take risks and and tweak things and even sort of go back to tools they may have disregarded six months ago because now there's, you know, so much advancement in the technology. And a big part of helping both of these individuals build their AI literacy, comes from how we, build the skill set, when they're in their collegiate experiences. So both students and professionals need environments where they get this hands on practice, all the time. Right? So, not surprised by the trends, at all. Yeah. That makes a ton of sense. And we touched on this a little bit, but it's particularly interesting to look at how these play out across Gen z and these young graduates who are entering the workforce. And in fact, they struggle more heavily than other generations with communication and with AI. They're more likely to report a lack of confidence due to poor communication. They're more likely to be spending their time at work on unproductive tasks, and they're more likely to feel uncertain about when and how AI applies to their job. And so learning how to effectively leverage AI can really help these young professionals navigate the workplace with greater confidence and efficiency. Definitely. And from all the data that we've parsed through in our annual report, one thing is really clear. Professionals who communicate more effectively and use AI often, and effectively achieve better outcomes. They're more productive. They experience less burnout, and overall workplace stress goes down. The more AI fluent professionals are, the more they are able to wield new tools, enhance the impact rather than just to have it fit into the mold of others and and the ways of, you know, their predecessors in their role. And because communication is particularly ripe for AI intervention, the professionals who are turning to it to streamline communication are turning that savviness into this competitive advantage within their organization and also, amongst, you know, businesses. So the rest of the their, you know, their industry has to catch up. The rest of their coworkers and different teams have to catch up to them, which is, you know, a a way that they're building more psychological safety at work. And this is changing how we view the core skills of professionals and what people need now to excel, at scale in their work in their workplace. So, there are three broad skills professionals need to be successful today. Higher education is already delivering and positioned to be the premier environment for these future professionals to develop these skills. However, there is a need to emphasize communication and AI literacy at the moment to ensure students are best positioned to succeed at this really unique moment in time. So, Abby, can you tell us a little bit more about why communication and AI literacy are so important in the modern workplace? Yeah. Happy to. So every year we've done this report with Grammarly, we've consistently seen that those who communicate better at work in experience a lot of positive outcomes. They save time. They're more productive. They have better personal experiences at work, and all of that is still true. What is new is that AI fluency is amplifying those benefits to a significant degree. And so when you look at productivity, you can see that there is a 12 percentage point increase in productivity for those who are both strong communicators and AI fluent compared to their peers. And that is obviously a big metric for business leaders and for organizations measuring their ROI, but there are also a lot of personal metrics that come into it around the human experience. Right? We see that those who can communicate well and use AI effectively in the workplace have improved relationships with colleagues, improved quality of work, increased work satisfaction, and increased confidence at work? Well, the and is really, really important here. Right? So for the past couple of years, we've been grappling with how AI is integrated into education and the workplace. It's not a new skill that should be bolted on to work and learning similar to traditional soft skills. It's something that allows professionals to best deliver and execute on their domain expertise. So professionals who communicate better, who are more adaptable, and who possess critical thinking are more effective in their roles. And all those skills are now being enhanced when they use AI. So while there should be sort of, communication specific courses and AI specific courses, the most effective professionals and students will be those who are able to deploy these skills across both types of, courses to enhance the value of their domain expertise. That's such a great point. And what is really valuable about when professionals are able to leverage the skill sets across their domain is that these benefits are translating all the way up to the c suite and to company's bottom line. And what's cool is that AI or communication is the amp the megaphone that sort of amplifies AI's gains. And what I mean by that is AI drives positive outcomes. For example, 95% of the c suite reports that AI drives faster innovation. We also see that effective communication drives increased ROI on technological investments, so exponentially increasing that benefit. C suite respondents tell us that AI increases quality of service and that effective communication increases customer satisfaction. We even see that 91% say that it drives higher employee engagement and increases revenue for their organization, while 96% say that effective communication supports new business or brand or deals going directly to the bottom line. This also aligns in an interesting way with research from the journal of Oxford Economic Papers, which shows that college grads with AI capital or business related AI studies listed on their resumes or cover letters were far more likely to receive an in interview invitation and also higher wage offers compared to those who did not. I have heard that. So what's the big so what about all of this? Businesses and professionals are struggling with AI just as much as education institutions. They know AI is having a positive impact on their bottom line and workforce productivity, but they lack the skills across the entire workforce to harness those benefits at scale. Less than 40% of today's workforce are AI literate or fluent, and only 13%, possess the skills that correlate with the positive outcomes and experiences we've been talking about. Less burnout, more more, you know, overall engagement and role. The businesses are desperately trying to upskill their workforce, but at the same time are looking for qualified professionals and graduates to infuse these skills into their businesses. So this creates a tremendous opportunity for students who not only have the domain expertise to do their jobs, but also the AI proficiency to help businesses adopt AI across their organizations, which is why you are seeing those trends, in interview processes. So this creates a major opportunity for institutions, especially as people are questioning the value of this higher education degree. It's not about domain expertise anymore. So this is, really interesting if you think about this in the context of the ROI of a higher ed degree. So the current and future workforce needs a tremendous reskilling and higher ed more than any other moment, an environment is best positioned to equip them. So business leaders are looking to AI fluent professionals to help them build their roadmap for workforce wide AI adoption, and educators can do the same thing to build their roadmap for preparing AI fluent students. So let's take a look at how these AI fluent professionals are using AI. So, Abby, give us some insight as how they're showing up to work. Yeah. It's interesting. I know as a hiring manager myself, I see that AI fluent professionals are able to infuse it across many disciplines like you mentioned. They're able to reap exponential benefits, and I see the gap getting bigger and bigger between those who are implementing it and those who are not in terms of their productivity, their ability to get up to speed quickly on topics, their ability to refine and, polish thinking faster and better. So we see huge impacts of AI fluency in in the people that we hire and and that I work with here at Harris. Yeah. And I know you're a hiring manager as am I. I love, you know, one of the things I'm really looking for now, than I even, was even two years ago, is really trying to understand, a a candidate's adaptability and sort of, track record of trying new things. And how does AI sort of complement building that, that skill set that is, I think, one of the biggest predictors for me and in working at an AI company of how agile they are gonna be in their thinking and how, risk averse or risk ready they will be, because a a lot of what's gonna be future state hasn't even been built yet, and we need thinkers. We need people who are confident and creative and understand that, being less wrong tomorrow is the goal, not just being right. How have you changed any of your hiring considerations, Abby? Yeah. It's definitely something that we look for, and I wholeheartedly agree that we are looking for folks who are interested and excited to lean into it. They don't necessarily have to know all the answers to your point, but they have to be willing to try, especially in the business of research curiosity. And and in the thought leadership practice that I run, engagement with the future and key trends shaping the future of work and society is critical for the folks that we're working with. And so we see that the people who are leaning into AI really fit the mold of the curiosity and, agility that we're seeking. I also find I have these moments of pure joy and delight just because the technology is so powerful. It allows me to just gosh. You know, I can't even, like, think about this what twenty years ago if someone said, Jen, you're gonna have a magic wand and you're gonna be able to do all these things very quickly. So I do also experience a lot of those micro joy moments just by testing to see what the AI might recommend even if it's not something that I, agree with. I I just love the ability to test my thinking and and really, double down on my, you know, either initial thought or augment my thought process. So, one of the things, that we wanna make sure we communicate today are some of these key pillars that, we're seeing, business leaders focusing on to increase this AI literacy across their workforce. So the the first point being, don't try to bolt AI onto work. Like, don't just slap AI over it. Like, integrate into it. Right? Have students experiment with AI in the workflow that they already do, into the things that take up time and don't add value. And then, be able to, augment the things that they're really passionate about. Right? How how can AI complement student doing passion projects or or the the the research that they're most motivated by? And the goal is to just increase familiarity. Right? Like, it's not to, create a product that is absolutely perfect with little time spent. That's not the goal. The goal is to definitely show this augmented process, and have this sort of, metacognitive dance between human created and bot created and give them a lot of at bats with that workflow. Second point is to focus on improving their work rather than automating it. Right? AI literacy is not this theoretical skill, it's learned in the doing. Instead of just using AI to write a paper, or automate technical knowledge, use it to challenge your ideas. Use it to, you know, even offer different perspectives. Or somebody was reading my paper, who believes, entirely different way, like, how would they criticize this work and and to keep those ideas in mind, and create instances where students are solving problems and expand their thinking with AI assistance. And then the third point here is, not focusing on getting things done faster. Right? How do we create more value with AI and not just creating the like I said, the product, being what, the the product is no longer the product. The process becomes a product with AI. And, this is seen in our ability to deliver net new ideas or even IP and enhancing the expertise we all possess as you unique human trait that is creativity and how we can, extend what we are able to achieve with that expertise and that unique human, capability. So before we, finish today, I really wanna highlight the work that Grammarly has been doing to support educators through this transition into this new era of generative AI. Grammarly has been focusing on these topics we discussed today from a thought leadership perspective and also, deeply integrating, these workflows into how we think about delivering best in class, innovation within our product. Today, both students and professionals are using Grammarly to write more clearly, confidently, transparently, and our robust controls allow institutions to set the parameters on how students use GenAI in line with their academic integrity policies while also giving students access to tools that we we emphatically know that they will be using, as professionals. So, you're gonna see a poll on your screen. If you would like to learn more about how Grammarly is going, to continue to support, this adaptability and this AI fluency, how to support your students and faculty and staff, please go ahead and select yes in the poll. And then there's some next steps. Meet you can meet with our team. You can also share your thoughts at the end of today's session. There will be a brief survey to share your thoughts on on how we did. And also check your inbox because you're gonna receive a recording of this, session in your email by tomorrow. Abby, I wanna thank you. As always, I love having these conversations with you, and I, I look forward to engaging with all of the audience who share our interest in this topic as we continue to, innovate around AI fluency to prepare better professionals. Thank you, everybody. Have a great day.