Investment in digital transformation has yet to be translated into improved productivity or digital maturity, Docusign’s Digital Maturity Report 2024 shows.

The research amongst 600 decision makers in the UK and Irelands, now in its second year, reveals a stark productivity and efficiency paradox for employers, but also a Catch-22 for workers.

Technology investment is increasing, but workers are wasting more time on manual processes than this time last year – and more are considering leaving their roles due to a desire to abandon legacy ways of working.

Furthermore, the disparity between worker and organisation digital maturity is widening: fewer than half of organisations (47%) see themselves as digitally mature vs 84% of workers.

According to the data, this is compounding to create a £275m productivity black hole.

Nearly two working days a week are wasted on low or no-value tasks, an increase from last year’s data, despite an increase in digital investments in an effort to find efficiencies.

This translates not only into a high cost for UK businesses – reaching £271,574m, but lower worker satisfaction as well.

Repetitive tasks and a desire to abandon legacy ways of working is a major factor causing 41% (up from 33% in 2023) of UK respondents to consider leaving their companies.

In reaction to this, improving efficiencies in day-to-day work is a top priority for companies, expected to have the biggest impact on company performance and productivity in the next year.

Silent Hiring

72% of business decision-makers report having a skills gap when it comes to technology – up from 69% in 2023.

Skills gaps in AI (6%), data analytics (62%), and security (61%) are the most common issues.

Talent shortages are impacting 53% of businesses which claim they are not able to deliver against operational imperatives because of a lack of talent.

“Workers today are in a catch 22” explains Ronan Copeland, group VP and general manager at Docusign EMEA.

“42% want to allocate more time to training on and experimenting with digital tools with AI and other new digital tools that could improve their day-to-day work and save them time, but they can’t find that time while they are still being held back by manual tasks.”

To address these issues, companies are increasingly focussing on ‘quite hiring’ and AI technology, with 44% allowing staff to upskill, and a third (34%) offering workers the chance to retrain.

Businesses have also increased their use of AI tools like ChatGPT since last year by 10% to 34%.

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AI Readiness to AI Impact

In the next year, 35% of companies plan to invest more in AI and machine learning.

But while organisations recognise the potential for AI to improve cost efficiencies (33%) and employee productivity (29%), only 43% of organisations actually feel a high level of AI readiness.

Only around one in ten (11%) have appointed a specific person to be in charge of AI, with the responsibility often falling on CTOs/CIOs (32%) or CEOs (29%).

Only around one in five (19%) of companies are constantly experimenting with new disruptive technology innovations, with many concerned about their AI risks, such as security (35%) and data protection (34%).

However, 46% of respondents state they want to dedicate more time to training on and experimenting with digital tools.

Companies in the UK and Ireland are in a paradoxical situation: they expect AI to provide relief but are still plagued by inefficient manual processes and lack sufficient resources to build expertise.