AI use among US employees has doubled in recent years. Meanwhile, 28% of Talent Development (TD) professionals have extremely high hopes that it’ll benefit learning impact evaluation in the years to come. It’s time to talk about the potential impact of AI-powered learning.
In a time when many employees fear being replaced, AI training tools could offer a better way. An outcome where AI enables Human Success by delivering personalized, equitable, and adaptable training access.
The connection between learning and engagement
Training, whether it’s AI-powered learning or something more traditional, impacts employee engagement in a couple of ways:
- Eliminating performance blockers: Few things are more disengaging than having to hand off some part of your job because you don’t know how to do it. Training gives employees the knowledge to understand their roles and the skills to navigate any professional situation.
AI-powered training solves performance blockers by allowing L&D teams to quickly and cost-effectively build bespoke training courses. The right skills and knowledge make people more confident and autonomous.
- Employee development as a business priority: It’s a simple fact that employees are more likely to care about their work if they feel their employer cares about them in turn.
That’s why investing in employee training is a great engagement strategy. If working for you means better training opportunities, it shows employees you care about their development and will improve their future career prospects.
How a lack of training leads to disengagement
Employees become disengaged for countless reasons. But a common theme is that we often lack the tools or skills to do our jobs as effectively as we’d like. If you miss targets, it can feel like your employer has set you up for failure.
At that point, it’s easy to stop caring. Analyst insights back this up. Gallup puts global employee engagement at just 21%, while less than half (47%) of US employees know what’s expected of them at work.
Your people need purpose
Purpose is an intrinsic motivator. It might stem from the kind of job you have, like becoming a doctor to save lives, or working for an ethics-based employer like an animal rights group.
More generally, however, purpose can come from feeling like your job has an impact on the wider business. That’s is where AI-powered learning comes in. The more skills your people have, the more likely they are to aim high and achieve great things.
On the other hand, without a sense of purpose and growth, employees won’t feel the need to push themselves. Even the highest salary in the world won’t keep them from becoming disengaged. They may keep showing up, but only to get paid.
AI-powered learning: What do analysts say?
As we blaze a trail through the AI era, we’re seeing plenty of analyst groups announce their expectations of what it will mean for the world of work. Some are highly optimistic, while others seem more cautious. Let’s cut through the noise and see what they have to say.
Zensai and ATD’s learning report
Last year, we sponsored the Association for Talent Development (ATD) to conduct analysis and produce a report, The Future of Evaluating and Measuring Learning Impact. According to the report:
- Only 16% of respondents rated their organization “proficient” at measurement and evaluation.
- Just 4% rated their organization “excellent.”
- 66% believe the need to prove the financial benefits of talent development will increase over the next two years (from 2025).
- 28% predict that AI will have an “extremely positive” impact on measuring learning program effectiveness over the next two years.
Human analysts can be limited by the data they have ownership over. On the other hand, a properly positioned AI can draw data from multiple sources across departments for more unified insights. Then there’s the fact that AI can collect and analyze data autonomously, in a fraction of the time.
While other analyst groups don’t focus on AI-powered learning specifically, they do have some interesting and relevant insights.
Gallup tracks AI use
According to Gallup, AI use among US employees has nearly doubled over the past two years. Those using it “a few times a year or more” went from 21% to 40%, while frequent use rose from 11% to 19%.
Second, less than half (44%) say their organization has started integrating AI. And only 22% have established a clear integration strategy. So, while usage is generally increasing, we’re still in the early days on the road to maturity. So, businesses may initially have to train employees to take part in AI-powered learning to experience its full benefits.
Gartner’s AI trends
As tech disrupts our workflows, Gartner’s findings show that 6 in 10 employees still lack on-the-job coaching. That means they’ll miss critical opportunities to learn from peers and managers. AI-assisted learning management can help address this by recommending coaching or mentorships to individual learners as needed.
Gartner have also identified the potential for AI-powered “nudgetech” (automated prompts) for bridging communications gaps, like how our platform reminds employees to fill out their weekly check-in.
Fosway’s findings
According to Fosway’s HR Realities 2025 report:
- 51% believe AI’s impact on HR is NOT overhyped, while fewer than one in five believe that it is.
- The percentage of skeptics previously skewed closer to one in three.
- 95% of respondents have experienced at least some impact on HR by AI.
- 30% experienced “a moderate amount” of AI impact.
- 22% reported “quite a lot” and 15% reported “a great deal.”
At the same time, however, 59% believe all HR processes need a “human in the loop.” So, while AI-powered learning may be a game-changer, we can’t ignore the role of people in its implementation.
How to engage employees with AI-powered learning
Now that we’ve established AI’s increasing impact on the employee experience and the connection between learning and engagement, let’s go over the practical applications of AI agents in the L&D space. Here are three applications of AI-powered learning, as well as how they’ll help you to motivate and engage your people.
Diversifying course content
While AI is about much more than its ability to generate content, its usefulness can’t be denied. AI-powered learning supports content creation in a couple of ways:
- Content creation and gamification: AI tools like Microsoft Copilot and Zensai’s Orbie can instantly convert documents, videos, and other files into functional course materials. AI can even create quizzes and other exercises to test knowledge and promote healthy competition.
- Recommendations for course building: AI course builders can also make recommendations based on the libraries at your disposal. If you’re running compliance training, for instance, Zensai’s course builder might recommend relevant material from Content365 that covers recent regulatory changes.
Personalized learning and development
Learning path personalization is a huge part of how we support AI-powered learning at Zensai. While you’ll still need to assign mandatory training based on role types and performance data, encouraging employees to seek out training on their own promotes the kind of personal growth that’s essential to engagement.
AI can consider roles and performance along with employee sentiment and find the most helpful (and interesting) content recommendations. This helps to prevent choice paralysis. It also boosts engagement and motivation by giving your people the skills they need to meet challenges and overcome blockers that could otherwise disengage them.
Reporting and analytics in AI-powered learning
While businesses excel at rating participant satisfaction, far fewer are capable of using learning data to inform business decisions.
Our Human Success Platform breaks down the walls between learning, engagement, and performance for a fuller picture of talent management. By aggregating data from each of these areas, our platform blends quantitative data with qualitative, sentiment-based insights.
By connecting AI-powered learning to performance and business goals, for example, L&D teams can prove training effectiveness in concrete ways. AI tools also make real-time reporting more attainable by recovering time wasted on manual data collection.
Rather than giving employees the training you think they want, AI identifies the training they know they need. Even without AI personalization and course building, analytics and reporting alone lay the foundation for more impactful L&D.
AI-powered learning will drive engagement in 2026
As we move further into the new year, we expect today’s engagement challenges to become even more pressing. Individual employees may feel they’re less relevant in the AI era. And this could be a recipe for even worse levels of disengagement.
But the times we live in are what we make of them. AI-powered learning tools can meaningfully connect learning with business objectives to give employees purpose. Meanwhile, AI-personalized learning paths give them greater control over their career development.
Together, these things can motivate your people by instilling a sense of purpose and showing how their upskilling and efforts can tangibly benefit the business.
If you’re eager to learn more about how AI can enhance learning and development for your organization, check out our on-demand webinar. In it, we discuss AI-powered learning with the transportation services company Penske: How AI Drives Measurable Impact in L&D.