There Are No Shortcuts for Human Connection
Balancing digital efficiency with authentic communication.
Researchers at the University of Florida asked more than 1,100 working professionals to rate messages from their managers. Some of those messages were written with a little help from AI. Others were written mostly by AI. When managers leaned heavily on AI, only 40% to 52% of employees saw them as sincere. When managers used very little, that number jumped to 83%. The message used in the study was a simple note congratulating a team for hitting its goals. (FN1)
It would be easy to read that and decide AI is the problem. It isn't. Every leader already knows that recognition, coaching, and real conversations matter. That hasn't changed. What has changed is how easy it is to hand those things to a tool and call it being efficient. The study isn't really about technology. It's about leadership, and AI is making the gaps easier to see.
Great leadership has always been about people
Regardless of AI, great leadership has always been about people and the connections you build with them. Your team doesn't follow you because your emails are well written. They follow you because they trust you, because you notice the work they do, and because you are there for them when it matters. AI doesn't change any of that. It can help you plan, stay organized, and spot things you might miss, but it can't care about the people on your team. No machine can.
Trying to have AI do the people work for you will cost you more in the long run. People can tell. Maybe not the first time, but over time a message that sounds polished and nothing like you starts to feel empty. Once your team stops believing your words are really yours, everything you send them carries less weight. That's a hard thing to earn back.
AI won't fix a leader who phones it in
Performance appraisals have surfaced as one of the biggest areas managers are using AI to try to shortcut the process. Most of us have worked for a leader who pencil whipped them. They waited until the deadline, used a version of the associate's self-appraisal, submitted it, and moved on. The review was finished, but the conversation never really happened.
Now that same leader can have AI write the review in minutes and it will likely read better than anything they’ve written before. It will use the right words and sound thoughtful. But the effort is the same, and so is the impact. The associate still walks out of the meeting feeling like nobody was paying attention. In one recent survey, 26% of employees said they suspected their own review was written by AI. (FN2) AI didn't create that kind of leader. They’ve always existed; now they just sound a little smarter.
The same is true for recognition. A phoned-in thank you has always been easy to spot. "Great job this week, team, your hard work is appreciated" could have been sent from any one at any time across the company. Compare that to telling Maria you saw her rebuild the endcap after the initial product sold down, and it looked better than the original planogram.The first is generic. The other tells Maria you were paying attention and that it meant something to you. If you were going through the motions before, AI will help you go through them faster. If you were putting in the work before, AI can provide options for you do it better.
Let AI do the prep, then you do the people part
The goal isn't to stop using AI. It's to be clear about which part of the work is yours to do and which parts can be assisted by other options. Using different tools and resources has never been a problem on the surface; it is when you give the entire responsibility over to the tool that people begin to get into trouble. That is not new with AI, it has just become even easier to do than before. Here are some other ideas for using AI to be effective and human at the same time.
Planning and important dates. Use AI to help plan your week and remind you of birthdays, work anniversaries, and other dates that matter to your team. Then take care of the human part yourself. A reminder that pops up on your phone is useful. A leader who stops by to say happy anniversary is what people remember.
Meetings and store visits. Let AI build the recap and point out insights you might not have caught on your own. That can be a real time saver. But have the follow-up conversations yourself. The recap tells you what was said. It doesn't tell you how the manager felt when she said it.
Performance reviews. Ask AI for ideas on how to structure a review or how to approach a tough conversation. If you're in the habit of capturing notes from store visits or regular 1:1 meetings, let AI look through them for patterns or opportunities worth bringing up. That can be a smart use of the tool. Then have the conversation in your own words and your own voice.
Email. AI can filter your inbox and even suggest how to respond. When a simple "Got it" is all that's needed, let AI handle it. The emails that include recognition, coaching, or your specific perspective are the ones you write yourself.
Know the difference between your voice and the AI voice
Your team has heard you talk for months or years. They know how you sound when you're proud of them and how you sound when something needs to change. When a message shows up that doesn't sound like you, they notice, even if they never say anything. Part of leading well right now is knowing the difference between your voice and the AI voice, and protecting the moments that need yours.
A simple test helps. Before you send anything that touches a person, ask yourself whether your team would know it came from you. If the answer is no, slow down and rewrite it. It might take five extra minutes. Those five minutes are where trust gets built and connection and engagement happen. AI is going to keep getting better at the planning, the summaries, and the busy work. Use it. Let it give you time back. Then spend that time on the conversations, the recognition, and the follow-up that only you can do. There are no shortcuts for human connection.
How are you leveraging AI for the right things and not letting it be your voice when your team needs to hear from the ‘real’ you?
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FN1 - https://news.ufl.edu/2025/08/writing-ai-work/
FN2 - https://www.techradar.com/ai-platforms-assistants/huge-numbers-of-managers-admit-to-using-ai-to-convincingly-draft-or-revise-performance-reviews-and-i-fear-it-will-only-accelerate-the-death-of-traditional-hr