Salesforce has revealed new research showing that the knowledge workers’ use of AI in their personal lives, not top-down corporate mandates, are driving trust and confidence in using AI at work.
66% of knowledge workers said that their personal use of AI has increased the trust they have in using AI tools at work. With increasing personal use, the time is ripe for enterprises in ASEAN to drive enterprise AI adoption and value by creating an AI-fluent workforce.
With trust in AI on the rise, 69% of knowledge workers in ASEAN also said that their personal use of AI has increased their confidence in using AI tools at work. This trust and confidence in using AI tools at work is the highest among Gen Z, with 72% report having high confidence in AI and 69% saying they have high trust in AI.
The survey conducted by YouGov and commissioned by Salesforce, surveyed 4,062 knowledge workers across ASEAN including Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines to understand worker attitudes and perceptions of AI/agentic AI.
Skills and knowledge gap a risk to enterprise value
Nearly all knowledge workers in ASEAN expect to use AI and AI agents at work, and for their jobs to change to some degree. Only 3% of knowledge workers in ASEAN expect never to use AI agents while 75% have interacted with or are already using agentic AI.
However, despite a clear openness to adopting agentic AI, there is a skills and knowledge gap emerging which can prevent businesses from activating Agentic AI to its fullest extent.
2 in 5 (42%) ASEAN knowledge workers want a better understanding of the skills they need to develop for the AI era, with the majority receiving limited training on agentic AI:
- Only 32% of knowledge workers in ASEAN say their company is training them on how to use AI agents
- Only 26% of workers say their company is investing in new tools and forums for peer-to-peer AI agent knowledge sharing
- Only 23% are encouraging managers and executives to share how they use AI agents as a model/example
Companies that fail to provide workers access to enterprise-grade AI solutions risk a rise in shadow AI —the use of unapproved tools that operate outside the organisation’s visibility or control. This lack of visibility creates significant security vulnerabilities, most notably the exposure of sensitive data.
A skills gap can further exacerbate these risks: when employees with limited training use AI without mastering prompt engineering or fact-checking outputs, they inadvertently introduce inaccuracies and run into compliance issues.
“While the growing trust in AI across ASEAN is being driven from personal curiosity, individual use alone doesn’t translate to enterprise-scale impact and trusted business outcomes,” said Paul Carvouni, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Salesforce ASEAN.
“For businesses, this is a clear signal to move: our workforce is ready, but it is up to organizations to provide the secure, enterprise-grade frameworks and skills support that turns personal use of AI into a coordinated engine for growth and innovation in the Agentic Enterprise.”
Knowledge workers in ASEAN ready to collaborate with AI as long as there is transparency and access to quality tools
When asked how AI will impact their work in the future, 35% of knowledge workers said they expect to use AI agents to both automate some tasks and augment others. 28% believe human-to-AI collaboration skills will be crucial in the future.
With human-AI collaboration increasingly a given, knowledge workers in ASEAN want clarity and high quality tools in order to feel confident using AI agents. Top three factors that will make knowledge workers feel more confident using AI agents at work are:
- High level of transparency and control – knowing what actions the AI agent took and why (43%)
- Easy access to approved, high-quality tools (42%)
- Understanding into skills workers should develop (42%)
Paul Carvouni added, “To succeed in the AI era, companies should see AI not just as a technology investment, but as a people transformation. The results clearly show that workers in ASEAN are accepting and willing to embrace AI.
“What we need now is to build AI fluency: the ability to confidently collaborate with AI and drive business impact at speed and scale. AI fluency across the region is what will transform AI from a mere technology innovation into an economic advantage for ASEAN.”
Rising stakes: the AI-first consumer in ASEAN
The research also acts as a reminder for businesses: knowledge workers’ personal use of AI is raising their expectations as consumers, making AI a competitive necessity. 46% of knowledge workers now expect faster and more efficient services, while 45% expect greater accuracy and fewer errors from businesses they interact with. 41% expect more innovative or intelligent solutions.
9% of respondents said that their expectations remained unchanged.
Key survey highlights:
- AI use cuts across generations. While GenZ leads AI use, Millennials and GenX are not too far behind
- Among knowledge workers surveyed, GenZ’s use of AI at work outpaces Millennials and GenX by just 4 percentage points on average, challenging the notion that older workers are not as AI-savvy
- GenX (37%) is more likely to view AI agents as an enabler allowing them to work outside their area of expertise than Millennials (30%) and GenZ (29%)
- ASEAN knowledge workers have interacted with or are using AI agents at work and expect significant benefits from using agents
- 75% of knowledge workers in ASEAN have interacted with or are using agentic AI at work and the majority (74%) agree that their job will change at least moderately as tasks are shared with AI agents
- 51% of knowledge workers in ASEAN expect AI to enhance their speed of completing tasks, while 34% expect to enhance the quality of their work using AI
- 39% of knowledge workers in ASEAN expect to use AI agents to enhance their performance at work, beyond simple automation (16%)
- Top three ways in which AI agents are currently augmenting workers in ASEAN
- Providing quick access to information, eliminating the need for extensive research (48%)
- Assisting with writing and communication, saving me time and effort (45%)
- Helping me brainstorm ideas and overcome creativity block (43%)
- Top three job skills workers believe will be most crucial in the Agentic Enterprise era
- Data analysis and interpretation (38%)
- Creative thinking (35%)
- Problem solving (34%)