Customers at one call center started asking for a manager less often. The reason - the new hires on the team suddenly started answering almost as well as their experienced colleagues.
Behind this is a study at a large American company - researchers measured the productivity of thousands of customer support agents. For new hires, it rose by about 30%. For experienced staff, it barely moved.
Where this boost actually happens
The biggest effect shows up on medium-difficulty questions - not too simple, not too rare. That's exactly where a new hire used to pull a manager away from their own work. Now the AI handles the question instead.
For a small business owner who can't afford an expensive, experienced specialist, this changes the economics of hiring. A new hire with an AI assistant reaches "veteran" level in two months instead of eight - and the expert ends up spending far less time training them.
Imagine this in your own kitchen
A beginner cook gets high-quality pre-made ingredients. On the plate, the dish looks almost like something a seasoned chef made, and the restaurant owner wins on speed and consistency.
But one day the supplier changes the sauce recipe, or disappears from the market. The experienced cook improvises. The beginner is lost - he's never made that sauce himself.
The owner's question is simple - which of the two is actually growing in this kitchen, while the supplier is still around.
The same question applies to your own team: is a new hire with a bot on hand actually learning - or just repeating its words while the bot does the work.