In 2025, technology is impacting the way we work more than ever. From the rise and fall of remote work to the explosive evolution of generative AI systems, the business world is unrelenting in its development over time.
The only way to ensure that you are equipped to weather these shifting trends is to stay up-to-date on how they impact your business. After all, understanding how people are using AI, whether employees still value remote work, and what we’re doing about the 4-day work week could be the difference between a happy staff and high turnover.
That’s why Tech.co is releasing our annual Impact of Tech report. We want to provide businesses with all the resources they need to stay in the know when it comes to the trends and topics that impact them. Through hours of in-depth research and strict surveys, we’ve got our finger on the pulse of workers, managers, and decision makers, so you can run your business more efficiently.
Impact of Tech on the Workplace Report 2025: Key Findings
This year, the Impact of Tech on the Workplace Report from Tech.co found a wide range of interesting and valuable statistics on topics like AI, remote work, burnout, cyber-crime, Right to Disconnect laws, and the 4-day work week. Take a look at some of our key findings below and check out the full report for a more detailed look at how technology impacts how we work.
- 88% of senior leaders state that technology has improved productivity at their business in the past 12 months.
- Only 15% of businesses state they have not used AI at all, compared to 34% in last year’s report.
- Only 27% of businesses have implemented policies that strictly limit the kind of data that can be shared with AI models.
- 78% of businesses that reduced their workforce due to automation plan to rehire to some degree.
- 44% of businesses have not changed their remote work policy over the past year.
- 38% of decision makers would consider implementing the 4-day work week.
- 77% of senior leaders support a France-style Right to Disconnect law.
Technology and Business Continue to Have a Positive Relationship
We’ll start off pretty simple; technology plus business equals success. In our research, we asked business owners and senior leaders to give us a little insight into how technology was impacting their work from a simple productivity standpoint, and the results were universally positive.
For starters, 88% of senior leaders noted that technology had improved productivity at these businesses over the past year. Obviously, technology has become vital when it comes to streamlining processes for businesses in the modern era, and falling behind can be catastrophic.
How exactly has technology improved productivity at these businesses? Well, respondents stated that operations (27%) had seen the most growth due to new technology, with sales (15%) and product development (14%) having also seen notable improvements over the past year.
Employees and Investors Agree That AI Is Here to Stay
If our research discovered anything it’s that AI is far from a passing fad in the business world. Since tools like ChatGPT became more popular for everyday users, the technology has exploded in usage within companies, and there are no signs of it slowing down.
Business adoption, in particular, has seen a substantial increase over just the last year. Only 15% of businesses state they have not used AI at all, compared to 34% in last year’s report. That means that 85% of businesses are — at least to a limited extent —utilizing AI tools within their organizations to improve productivity.
If you aren’t a business owner, this information is still important to you, as AI skills have become increasingly important within the hiring process. 87% of businesses believe that hiring employees with AI expertise is at least slightly important, compared to only 66% in 2023.
Business Policies Are Lagging Behind on AI
When it comes to AI technology, security and privacy should be a clear and obvious priority for business owners. However, despite the meteoric rise of generative AI technology in the business world, our research found that there is a lack of policy in place to protect sensitive data.
In fact, only 27% of businesses have implemented policies that strictly limit the kind of data that can be shared with AI models. This means that businesses dealing with customer information like Social Security numbers and medical data could be putting them at risk with their AI usage practices.
Even worse, the kinds of policies in place at those businesses aren’t necessarily following best practices for the industry. 32% are simply reviewing and approving AI tools before usage, 21% are just banning certain job roles from using AI, and another 11% are just banning AI usage outright.
Most Businesses Still Value Human Employees
The rise of AI has, understandably, made a lot of employees nervous about their future in the workforce. The technology is admittedly poised to replace a huge percentage of jobs over the next few years, but our research found that the majority of businesses are still interested in hiring actually humans to do the job.
Mass tech layoffs have been a sign that AI job cuts could already be here, but we found that 78% of businesses that reduced their workforce due to automation plan to rehire to some degree, leaving only 22% insistent that their new lean workforce will be all right without filling those roles.
The number of companies that are making roles redundant because of AI is on the rise, though. In 2024, 14% of business owners state that AI has extensively removed the need for certain job roles. In last year’s report, that number was only 8%.
Remote Work Is a Matter of Employee Satisfaction
Return-to-office mandates have been quite popular in the last couple of years, with businesses like Dell and Amazon announcing strict rules to do away with the pandemic-era policy. Still, while it might seem like remote work is on the way out, our research found that there are still a lot of businesses leaving flexible work on the menu, with many even increasing the number of work-from-home days allowed.
In our research, 44% of US businesses were found to have not changed their remote work policy in the past year. Even better, 10% of US businesses have actually increased the number of remote work days that employees are allowed, a big win for work-life balance.
As for why the perk is considered so valuable, 35% of respondents noted that it allows for a more flexible schedule. Another 20% stated that remote work enhances productivity, with another 13% pointing out that it allows workers to choose where they work.
Continued Momentum for the 4-Day Work Week
Just a few short years ago, the idea of a 4-day work week was nothing more than a pipedream for many workers around the world. However, in recent memory, countries and companies have gotten on board, giving the new way to work a fair shake, and the results have been quite positive.
As a result, more and more businesses are starting to wonder if five days a week at work is just too many. Our research found that 38% of US businesses would consider implementing a 4-day work week.
Suffice to say, this is a big change of opinion, even over the course of the last year. In last year’s report, only 23% of US businesses were considering a 4-day work week, with 25% stating that there were absolutely no intention of exploring the possibility.
Senior Leaders Are Contradictory on the Right to Disconnect
In some countries — like France, Belgium, and Portugal — the Right to Disconnect is protected by law, making it illegal to penalize employees for ignoring work-related communication outside of regular working hours. No such law currently exists in the US, but could it?
It’s definitely not out of the question, with our research finding that 77% of senior leaders at US businesses support some kind of Right to Disconnect law. This would be a nice reprieve for many workers, as only 17% of employees stated that they feel no obligation at all to respond to work-related messages while on vacation.
Still, while managers say they support it, their actions speak for themselves. 87% of senior leaders state that it is appropriate to contact colleagues while they are on vacation, for reasons ranging from an emergency or crisis that requires immediate action to non-critical operations that are somewhat time-sensitive.
The Impact of Tech 2025 Report: How We Did It
In order to get a feel for the current state of tech on the workplace, we surveyed 1,036 senior executives and workplace managers of businesses with 10+ employees. These businesses represented a wide range of industries, to ensure a good representative spread.
61% of the businesses we surveyed had 100 or more employees, with 7% having between 10 to 24. Gender-wise, our research was pretty much an even split, with 49% of respondents being female, and 51% being male.
To ensure impartiality, the data was gathered via a survey with participants selected via a third-party panel in September 2024.
Tech.co: Who We Are
Tech.co has been around since before the iPhone, first blossoming into life in 2006 as a networking platform for tech companies in the Chicago area to interact with each other and share ideas and inspiration.
Today, we’re a wide-reaching media company with readers all over the world, helping businesses find the best tech solutions, from CRM to Project Management, POS to Website Builders, and everything in-between. We also make sure to keep our readers up to speed on the ever-evolving world of tech, writing daily about what’s going on with AI, remote work, major corporations, and more.
At Tech.co, we carry out hundreds of hours of independent research across dozens of products and services, to help businesses make the right purchasing decisions, no matter their budget.
If you want to stay informed about tech, and what we’re building here at Tech.co, sign up for our weekly newsletter, or read more about us.
