The promise of productivity boosts from AI can come with an unwelcome side order of stress. Harvard Business Review found that AI doesn't reduce work; it intensifies it, leading to cognitive fatigue and unsustainable hours.

While the common perception is that AI can help reduce workloads, allowing employees to focus more on higher-value and more engaging tasks, HBR's research found that staff using AI worked more quickly and often ended up with more to do, not less.

While we've written about how some professionals are finding ways to turn AI's time-saving magic into a productivity superpower, we've also recognized that some employees have started to become tired with the low quality of AI outputs.

Ankur Anand, group CIO at tech recruiter Harvey Nash, said professionals who want to avoid cognitive fatigue must understand how to use AI effectively and its potential risks.

"That focus will help to reduce the noise around the workload that AI creates," he told ZDNET, suggesting that many people have unrealistic expectations about the productivity boost that AI will provide.

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