They say artificial intelligence has limitless potential, but can it make our jobs more enjoyable? Yes, according to HP.
When HP talks about 'work' they refer to knowledge workers – people in offices – who are more likely to use the company's hardware and services. In that arena, where remote and flexible work have become top priorities and almost default scenarios, business leaders and their employees are actually struggling.
In its Work Relationship Index, HP has found that the average knowledge worker is troubled by their 'relationship' with work. The Index surveyed 15,600 people, and only 28% of those respondents said that relationship is healthy.
That was just a one-point increase compared to the same survey that was produced for HP Imagine 2023. In simple terms, how we feel about work is currently not all that good.
HP suggests there are two potential solutions to improve this, one is AI and the other is more personalized work experiences. Although, digging into the details, HP's Index also suggests that workers want more collaboration and better working hours, but also improvements to work environments and management practices. Nevertheless, it's AI that the company has focused on.
"When you are working you care about being productive, you care about not waiting, you care about getting the best in AI performance," Alex Cho, HP's president of personal systems said on stage at HP Imagine 2024. "We are going to raise the bar with AI performance."
Admittedly, using AI to solve these problems does feel like technology being used to solve the problems of technology. There is only so much we can do with video conferencing software or managing screen time – taking a break and going outside for some fresh air is still recommended as one of the best ways to improve productivity.
However, we are well into the age of the AI PC and HP's Index does create the idea that AI can drive better relationships between people and their office jobs.
What's more, demand for AI PCs is higher than ever. Recent research from AltIndex.com using data from Statista and Canalys shows that six-in-ten of all PCs sold by 2027 will be AI PCs – three times more than what is expected to be sold by the end of 2024.
Manufacturers are the main drivers of this trend, pushing out AI PCs as premium products, and even ditching popular lines for new NPU-based models.
Are computers getting personal?
HP believes the future of work is 'personal'. What it means here is that devices (maybe even software) should be more personalized to the user. This very much leads on from HP Imagine 2023, which was about AI helping to create a 'personal companion' rather than a personal computer.
In 2023, Cho, spoke about the coming AI revolution as a huge opportunity to fundamentally change the PC for the better. He talked about a world where the keyboard and mouse were left behind and replaced with the advancement of language models and sensors that recognize gestures or biometrics.
While the devices on display at HP Imagine 2024 didn't quite go that far, there were some innovative laptops and services that take the company a step further in that direction.
The launch of a new business-focused AI PC notebook, the EliteBook X, for example, promises to empower workers with locally processed data and a newly developed memory architecture that can reach 8000 Mbps on 64 GB of LPDDR5x RAM.
AI is also being infused into its printer hardware and print services. How IT teams monitor and resolve tech issues on HP equipment has also been tweaked with AI so that it can be centrally controlled and partly automated.
Will all that make us happy? You'll probably have to wait till next year's Work Relationship Index to find out.
