The News: Employee success platform Quantum Workplace announced the release of several new AI-powered features that are designed to improve efficiency and improve employee engagement. New AI features that are now available to customers include Smart Summary, Action Planning Idea Generator, Feedback Assistant, and Goal Generator, and are designed to operate within the flow of work and support human workers rather than replace them. You can read the press release on Quantum Workplace’s website.
Quantum Workplace Releases New Generative AI-Enabled Features
Analyst Take: Quantum Workplace is a provider of employee experience (EX) solutions spanning engagement (including lifecycle, pulse, and regular engagement surveys) as well as performance (including recognition, feedback, talent reviews, succession planning, goals, and one-on-ones). The company has been adding to its solution set, embedding AI into workflows to improve efficiency, and this most recent announcement is designed to further leverage AI to assist HR professionals with common tasks that often eat up valuable time.
Quantum Workplace generally focuses on mid-market customers, which it defines as 500 to 5,000 employees, though it does have some larger and smaller customers. The mid-market is a particularly enticing market, as many of these companies have HR staff but struggle to meet the growing demands of driving engagement, extracting and acting upon feedback and insights, and supporting ideation and goal-setting processes.
New AI Features
Quantum Workplace announced four AI-powered features that are designed to improve efficiency and help workers be more productive and are now generally available:
Smart Summary: This AI-powered feature was launched in August 2023 and has already garnered a Brandon Hall Group Excellence in Technology Silver Award. It is designed to help HR staff analyze survey comments. Generative AI is used to summarize survey comments from all users so that organizations can get a sense of what their employees are saying in real-time, with the added flexibility to edit or regenerate the text. According to Quantum Workplace, many of its customers have noted that it has reduced the amount of time required to analyze and code surveys by about 50%.
Action Planning Idea Generator: A key challenge faced by many HR staff is deciding how to act upon insights uncovered via surveys or other feedback processes. The Idea Generator is designed to leverage generative AI to create discussion starters for managers to ask questions of their teams, based on the insights from feedback tools. These are then combined with contextual data, such as any notes captured around the topic, the user’s role within the organization, and the industry in which the company operates. The AI tool then uses this data to generate actionable ideas for driving an initiative forward, which can be added to an action plan.
Goal Generator: Similarly, Quantum Workplace has released this AI-powered tool, which incorporates contextual information, such as the user’s role and department, to whom the user reports, and the company’s industry, and prompts the user to input responses around issues that matter to them. The tool then generates goals that should be focused on. Once a goal has been selected, the tool will start generating key results or ideas that can be leveraged in a goal-setting process. The tool is meant to be a starting point to help users set quality measurable goals that are relevant to a person’s role and to their organization.
Feedback Assistant: This generative AI tool is designed to serve as a catalyst or jumpstarting tool to help employees and managers provide feedback that is richer and more actionable. The tool takes the initial feedback provided by a user, and, if desired, will provide an option for making it more complete or fleshed out, via AI-generated suggestions. It can provide a reworded version of that feedback that gives more clarity and fixes the tone and directness of the feedback. According to Quantum Workplace, an early analysis of the tool demonstrated that individuals were two times more likely to come back and provide additional feedback in the future.
The entire Quantum Workplace platform is hosted on a secure and trusted cloud service provider with isolated model interaction to ensure data security and privacy, according to the company.
Quantum Workplace’s Measured Approach to Using AI
Quantum Workplace is incorporating generative AI in what appears to be a responsible and conservative manner, positioning the tools as assistants or tools that jumpstart work processes. In an era where many vendors tend to overpromise around the capabilities of generative AI, it is refreshing to see Quantum Workplace highlight more realistic uses of the technology while still delivering real ROI to HR departments.
The challenge I see with Quantum Workplace’s current offering is that the platform does not yet incorporate more personalized insights to drive generation. Personalization has become table stakes for consumers, and it is rapidly becoming a key point of differentiation in the B2B space. In a discussion with Quantum Workplace on future roadmap, it does appear that the product teams will be incorporating a greater degree of personalization into its generative AI tools in the near future, which is a good sign for driving user adoption and ROI.
Disclosure: The Futurum Group is a research and advisory firm that engages or has engaged in research, analysis, and advisory services with many technology companies, including those mentioned in this article. The author does not hold any equity positions with any company mentioned in this article.
Analysis and opinions expressed herein are specific to the analyst individually and data and other information that might have been provided for validation, not those of The Futurum Group as a whole.
Other Insights from The Futurum Group:
Quantum Workplace Acquires Talent Keepers
Smart Summary Released by Quantum Workplace
Data Reinforces ‘Don’t Ask for Feedback You Are Not Prepared to Act On’
Author Information
Keith Kirkpatrick is VP & Research Director, Enterprise Software & Digital Workflows for The Futurum Group. Keith has over 25 years of experience in research, marketing, and consulting-based fields.
He has authored in-depth reports and market forecast studies covering artificial intelligence, biometrics, data analytics, robotics, high performance computing, and quantum computing, with a specific focus on the use of these technologies within large enterprise organizations and SMBs. He has also established strong working relationships with the international technology vendor community and is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and events.
In his career as a financial and technology journalist he has written for national and trade publications, including BusinessWeek, CNBC.com, Investment Dealers’ Digest, The Red Herring, The Communications of the ACM, and Mobile Computing & Communications, among others.
He is a member of the Association of Independent Information Professionals (AIIP).
Keith holds dual Bachelor of Arts degrees in Magazine Journalism and Sociology from Syracuse University.
