The Main Concerns of Employed People Regarding Robots at Workplace in the Digital Age

Robots are gradually becoming a part of workplace. A large number of businesses continuously introduce robots or robotic manufacturing systems. Employees are once again confronted with new technological achievements at work. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the main concerns of employees regarding the use of robots in the workplace. The empirical study, which took place in the period from October 2022 to January 2023, encompassed 94 participants. The findings revealed that the most common concerns were that robots do not possess capacity to react adequately in unexpected situations, that respondents would feel lonely if their co-workers were robots rather than people, and that robots lacked human flexibility and mobility. Findings obtained in this study can be used by decision makers and human resource managers with the aim to overcome the main concerns while implementing robots at workplace. It is highly likely that technological advancement will result in new type of robots which will have new features and characteristics that are increasingly human-like.