AI, Experience and the Human at the Center

If there was one unmistakable theme at this year's Gartner Digital Workplace Summit (DWS), it was this: the employee is at the center of the digital workplace conversation. This should not come as a surprise to anyone focused on the Digital Employee Experience (DEX), but it raises an important question. Why is this more critical now than ever?

The answer is: Artificial Intelligence (AI)

While AI is rapidly reshaping the digital workplace, success depends more than ever on how intentionally organizations design for people. As the opening keynote laid out, the human should be the north star for the AI native digital workplace journey.

Here are some of the key themes, predictions, and takeaways from the event.

Humans at the center of your AI journey

Gartner analysts emphasized that organizations are still struggling with AI adoption, not because the tools are not powerful, but because employees do not yet see the intent, value, or personal relevance. AI is one of the most individualistic technologies ever deployed. However, many organizations are either taking a "one-size-fits-all" approach or forcing AI adoption without clearly articulating what's in it for the user.

Gartner distilled these challenges into several practical insights organizations must act on to move AI from policy to productivity.

• Incentives beat mandates - Gartner stressed that forcing AI adoption backfires; rewarding meaningful use works better.
• Persona-based AI adoption is essential - One-size-fits-all AI rollouts fail. A finance analyst, a nurse, and a field technician need radically different AI workflows.
• Daily use builds "AI fitness" - The more employees use AI, the more value they extract—and the more the organization learns.
• AI "slop" is real - Not only because models can hallucinate, but because they can unintentionally strip intent from messaging. AI should be context-aware and enable employees to make clear, data-driven decisions.

AI succeeds when organizations use their most valuable asset, their employees, as the north star for their AI journey. Deploying AI in ways that simplify rather than disrupt workflows, that are personalized to each user's unique persona, and that are built on a foundation of trust with a clear "why" is critical. The organizations that win will be the ones that treat AI as a human capability amplifier, not a shiny new tool.

DEX leaders connect with the business to drive real value

Maturing DEX is hard work. Gartner continues to report that digital workplace maturity is hovering around 2.4 out of 5 for most organizations. What Gartner found in organizations that achieve higher DEX maturity, however, is leadership that moves beyond simply managing DEX scores. 

True DEX leaders have learned how to build a practice around meaningful metrics, a relentless focus on outcomes, and a strong cross-organizational commitment to employee experience. They understand that you cannot deploy a solution or build an operating model without designing it for the user. 

Truly understanding how employees work is foundational. Connecting that work to business value and clearly articulating how DEX contributes to outcomes enable organizations to move from reactive support to empowerment and transformation.

Gartner data makes one thing clear. Higher DEX maturity is not accidental. It is the result of deliberate leadership choices, reflected in the following key points.

• DEX must move beyond being a toolset and become a leadership discipline- Success depends on leadership that embeds DEX principles into strategy, governance, and day-to-day decision making.
• Organizations with higher DEX maturity intentionally connect organizational structure to value- They bridge IT, HR, communications, and the business to deliver exceptional employee experiences.
• Metrics matter, but not the ones organizations typically focus on - Gartner reinforced this clearly. Do not use metrics to tell a story. Instead, focus on humans, time, and experience.
• Experience first design wins - As Steve Jobs famously said, and Gartner echoed, "start with experience and work back toward technology."
• The most important thing to measure is often what is not reported - As with nonverbal communication, the most impactful experience signals are frequently what users are not reporting.
• DEX investment creates reciprocal value - When IT invests in the business and demonstrates measurable impact, the business is more willing to invest back into IT.

DEX and AI success should not be measured or reported based on the number of automations, reduced tickets, or even time saved. Their real value emerges when they are directly connected to how they enable users and the business to achieve outcomes, make decisions faster, and drive innovation. 

DEX leaders go beyond deploying and managing tools. They intentionally design experiences that help employees do their best work.

The future of EUC devices: AI PCs, DaaS and wearables

The endpoint landscape is rapidly shifting from a device-focused conversation to an experience-focused conversation. PCs, virtual desktops, wearables, and mobility are no longer independent technology decisions. They are converging into a broader discussion about how work is actually done and how organizations enable users as AI becomes increasingly embedded across the digital workplace.

Gartner predictions make it clear that the next phase of endpoint strategy will be defined less by what organizations deploy and more by how intentionally they design, refresh, and govern experiences across different personas.

• AI PCs are going mainstream - Gartner predicts that AI PC shipments will grow from 16 percent of the market in 2024 to 96 percent by 2029. These figures represent device shipments, not devices currently in use. For some time, the gap in AI capabilities between refreshed and non-refreshed devices is expected to continue widening.
• Near term PC growth will remain constrained - Availability challenges and rising costs will limit growth, making intelligent refresh strategies increasingly important. Organizations will shift focus from simply managing devices to managing experience, where it delivers the greatest impact.
• Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) total cost of ownership is now comparable to PCs - Rising hardware prices have narrowed the gap, making DaaS viable for more use cases than ever before. Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) adoption will continue to grow, with most deployments shifting toward cloud-hosted PCs rather than on-premises environments.
• Wearables are arriving faster than expected - Gartner anticipates that wearables, including rings, watches, and especially glasses, will become part of nearly every persona within the next five years. As new productivity and enablement use cases emerge, demand for wearables will increase, balanced against security, governance, and privacy requirements.

One noticeably absent topic was mobile experience. While mobile devices and always-on data connectivity are present across nearly all use cases, there was surprisingly little focus on mobile experience. The DEX Magic Quadrant does not currently require mobile experience, and most vendor solutions remain focused on Android rather than iOS. This is likely to change within the next year as demand continues to grow.

AI-capable devices, cloud-delivered desktops, and emerging form factors like wearables will force organizations to rethink refresh strategies, investment models, and how value is measured. At the same time, gaps in areas such as mobile experience highlight that maturity remains uneven. The organizations that succeed will be those that treat endpoints as dynamic experience platforms, align where they create the most impact, and proactively design for how people work today and how they will work next.

Top predictions for how people will work

So, how will the nature of end-user work change in the future? Gartner shared several bold, provocative predictions that, at times, sounded like science fiction. Rather than add my own narrative, I will highlight a few key themes for consideration.

• Users will continue to rely on PCs, but they will be deeply AI enabled
• Wearable technology will be present across most user personas
• AI assistants and autonomous agents will become ubiquitous
• By 2029, 60 percent of digital product user experiences will be built primarily for AI agents rather than humans
• Virtual desktops will continue to grow, with a strong shift toward cloud-delivered DaaS
• Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) style operational models will become the standard

So, what does this all mean? The future of work will be defined by rapid change, and the ability to adapt to new technologies and skills will become a core requirement. Gartner reinforced this with a powerful insight of its own. By 2030, the half-life of technical skills is expected to shrink to two to five years, down from eight to twelve years, making adaptability and learning velocity the most important hiring criteria. 

As the proverb says, "may you live in interesting times", which has never been more relevant than it is today.

"Zero Helpdesk" is the wrong goal

Here is where I take a slightly different slant from many current marketing messages, particularly the growing industry obsession with "zero tickets" or "zero helpdesk." It sounds like a great application of AI. It sounds innovative. It especially sounds like a CFO's dream.

However, the approach is often flawed.

In my view, tickets are the wrong measure of success for a modern helpdesk. DEX should not be measured by ticket volume, but by employees' ability to do their work uninterrupted.

Why is that?

• Ticket reduction does not equal a better experience - A decrease in tickets could indicate proactive IT, or it could mean employees have simply given up trying to get help.
• Employees dislike calling the helpdesk, but they dislike having no option to call even more - Users do not want to be forced into a single support channel. They want the flexibility to call or walk up to a person during their most critical moments.
• AI should augment support, not replace it - Context-aware agents can personalize responses and accelerate resolution, but they cannot replace human empathy.
• The real metric is uninterrupted work - Measure friction avoided through proactive issue resolution and the resulting productivity gain, not the number of tickets avoided.

It is critical to keep the human at the center of employee experience. A proactive IT experience should be the goal, one where user issues are identified, resolved, and communicated before they disrupt work. At the same time, support pathways should not be eliminated. Instead, IT support teams should be empowered with better tools and insights to resolve issues faster, while remaining accessible when users need them. 

The future belongs to IT organizations that are proactive, empathetic, and deeply connected to employee experience.

The human compass in an AI-native world

Walking out of the Gartner Digital Workplace Summit, one message stuck with me more than any other: technology doesn't create value, people do. AI, DEX platforms, AI PCs, wearables, and automation are powerful, but only when they're aligned to human needs, human workflows, and human potential. You cannot build a solution without building it for a user.

As digital workplace and IT leaders, our job isn't to chase the next tool or trend. It's to build workplaces where people can thrive, supported by AI, not overshadowed by it.

And the organizations that embrace both will define the next decade of digital experience.