Workplace Employee Productivity Trends for 2025: AI, Work-Life Boundaries, & Embracing Neurodivergence
Workplace Intelligence recently released its whitepaper on workplace trends for 2025. It identifies critical workplace trends we can expect to see next year based on extensive research and feedback from 20,000 employees, 4,000 HR leaders, and 2,000 C-suite executives. We’ll focus on the ones they identified that directly impact employee productivity in the workplace.
Artificial Intelligence: Change Everyday Operations With Everyday Tools
AI has been getting a lot of hype, and for good reason. Workers tend to be more productive using it. Prodoscore supports the research that AI contributes to higher productivity; in fact, our own data shows that those employees are up to 21% more productive than those who don’t and work almost 90 minutes more per day. But what exactly are the tools that make the best use of AI?
It doesn’t help that nearly every tech solution is now calling itself an AI solution rather than a tech solution powered by AI. We’re very careful about this at Prodoscore - it is an employee productivity monitoring solution powered by AI, not an AI solution in and of itself.
It’s also hard to find AI solutions that don’t simply replicate features available with Microsoft’s Copilot, Google’s Gemini, or OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Generally, avoid anything that will be another app for your employees to load up unless its benefits are too numerous to ignore. 77% of survey respondents say that separate AI tools added to their workload rather than helping.
Using ChatGPT on its own, even the paid version, has two disadvantages - it can use anything your company puts into it to train its own models, and it is only accessible in a separate app. If you are using Microsoft Office, use Copilot, and if you’re using Google Workspace, use Gemini for Workspace. Both are AI add-on tools very similar to ChatGPT which work natively with your productivity apps and firewall your company data.
While it is possible to firewall company data with ChatGPT, it has to be turned off on a per-user basis, which is a recipe for disaster. Using Copilot or Gemini is much safer while also working natively within whatever app you’re using, whether it is email or creating a document.
Apps like Motion use AI to analyze an individual’s tasks and schedule time for them on their calendar. While some of its features are native to Microsoft Office and Google Workspace with their AI add-ons, the dynamic scheduling makes it necessary for any staff who are working in a fast-paced environment with a high number of tasks.
HR will also continue implementing AI solutions for applicant screening and other purposes.
Work-Life Boundaries Will Become Employee-Informed
Nearly 69% of employees surveyed worked longer last year, including nights and weekends. Unsurprisingly, this leads to burnout and attrition. In 2025, HR leaders will actively be looking for ways to increase engagement and attract new talent, and making sure working hours are not unnecessarily extended is low-hanging fruit.
In addition to ensuring managers are sticking to company policies surrounding working hours, additional steps such as giving employees the right to disconnect while off the clock and a four-day work week could be implemented. Whatever the decision, it should be employee-led and carefully considered.
Redesigning the Workplace for Neurodivergent Staff
Neurodiverse is the term used for people with psychological or neurological differences that make them “think differently.” They could have dyslexia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorder (ASD), or similar conditions.
When appropriately managed, neurodivergence actually produces superpowers of hyperfocus and out-of-the-box thinking. However, 30-40% of neurodiverse people are likely to be unemployed, probably due to a misunderstanding of their disorder at places they’ve worked in the past.
With mental health and other types of support in place at the organization, neurodivergents are an asset to any team. In fact, companies that have more neurodiverse teams are more efficient at problem-solving and likely to exceed financial targets.
As a bonus, when everyday operations are changed to accommodate neurodiversity, neurotypical people will find systems easier to use and the culture more positive. It can be something as simple as discouraging multitasking or allowing employees to work on passion projects for a set amount of time per month. Redesigning the workplace to accommodate the neurodiverse also sets your business up for the next generational cohort, which has much higher numbers of diagnosed neurodiversity than previous generations.
While nobody can accurately predict what will happen in the future, Prodoscore can give you visibility into your company’s productivity data right now. If you implement new policies like a four-day workweek, you’ll be able to measure the “before” and “after” data. You’ll also be able to see who is using your AI tools and who isn’t, creating coaching opportunities. Prodoscore allows you to have real data about how productive your company actually is.
