Do AI hallucinations affect employee training strategies?
If you’re in the L&D field, you certainly realize that artificial intelligence is becoming an increasingly frequent tool. The training team uses it to streamline content development, create robust chatbots to accompany employees on their learning journeys, and design personalized learning experiences that fit the needs of learners perfectly. However, despite the many benefits of using AI in L&D, the risk of hallucination can ruin the experience. If you don’t realize that your AI is generating false or misleading content, using it in your training strategy can have more negative consequences than you think. In this article, we explore six hidden risks of AI hallucination in companies and their L&D programs.
6 Unidentified AI hallucination results in L&D content
Compliance risk
Most of the corporate training focuses on compliance topics, including job safety, business ethics and various regulatory requirements. AI hallucinations in this type of training content can lead to many problems. For example, imagine a chatbot with AI to suggest false safety procedures or outdated GDPR guidelines. If the information employees receive is unfamiliar with their profession or because they trust technology, they can expose themselves and their organization to legal troubles, fines and reputational damage.
Insufficient boarding
Onboarding is an important milestone in an employee’s learning journey and is the highest risk of AI hallucination. AI inaccuracy is most likely not to be noticed during onboarding as new recruits have no prior experience with the organization and their practices. Therefore, if you create a bonus or perk that didn’t have an AI tool, the employee will only accept it as truth if they find it later and feel misunderstood and disappointed. Such mistakes can hurt the onboarding experience and can lead to frustration and departure before new employees settle in their roles or form meaningful connections with their colleagues and supervisors.
Loss of reliability
Words about training program inconsistencies and errors can spread quickly, especially when invested in building learning communities within an organization. If that happens, learners may start to lose confidence in your overall L&D strategy. What’s more, how can you guarantee that AI hallucinations are a one-off event rather than a recurring problem? This is the risk of AI hallucination, as it can be very challenging to invite them again with future learning initiatives once learners become unsure of your credibility.
Reputation damage
In some cases, addressing your workforce skepticism regarding AI hallucinations may be a manageable risk. But what if you need to convince external partners and clients about the quality of your L&D strategy, not your own team? In that case, your organization’s reputation may take a hit that may struggle to recover. Establishing a brand image that encourages others to trust your product takes a considerable amount of time and resources. The last thing I want is that I made the mistake of overdoing it with tools with AI, so I have to rebuild it.
Increased costs
Companies primarily use artificial intelligence in their learning and development strategies to save time and resources. However, hallucinations of AI can have the opposite effect. When hallucinations occur, education designers must aggregate for hours through materials generated by AI to determine where, when, and how the mistakes will appear. If the problem is extensive, organizations may need to retrain their AI tools. This is a particularly long and expensive process. Another direct way that AI Hallucination risk can affect revenue is to delay the learning process. If users need to spend extra time fact-checking AI content, they can be less productive due to lack of immediate access to reliable information.
Inconsistent knowledge transfer
Knowledge transfer is one of the most valuable processes that take place within an organization. This includes sharing information between employees, ensuring that they reach maximum levels of productivity and efficiency for daily tasks. However, this set of knowledge collapses when an AI system generates an inconsistent response. For example, one employee can still receive certain instructions from another employee, even if they use similar prompts, leading to confusion and reduced knowledge retention. Apart from affecting the knowledge base available to current and future employees, AI Hallucinations poses significant risks, especially in the high-stakes industry where mistakes can have serious consequences.
Do you have too much trust in your AI systems?
The increase in AI hallucinations shows a wider range of issues that can affect organizations in one or more ways, and it relies on artificial intelligence. This new technology is impressive and promising, but in many cases it is treated by experts like the power to know everything that has never been wrong. At this point in AI development, and perhaps for years to come, this technology should not work without human supervision either. So, if you notice a surge in hallucinations in your L&D strategy, it probably means your team will put too much faith in AI and understand what to do without specific guidance. But it couldn’t be far from the truth. AI cannot recognize and correct mistakes. On the contrary, there is a greater chance of replicating and amplifying them.
Balance to deal with the risk of AI hallucination
It is essential for businesses to understand that firstly use AI involves certain risks and then there are dedicated teams to pay attention to tools that have AI-powered. This includes checking output, performing audits, updating data, and retraining the system. In this way, organizations may not be able to completely eradicate the risk of AI hallucinations, but they can significantly reduce response times so that they can deal with them immediately. As a result, learners have access to high-quality content and robust AI-powered assistants that don’t overshadow and enhance and emphasize human expertise.
