By 2025, the diversity and inclusion policies that were once centered on meeting specific quotas tied to gender, ethnicity, and other demographic identifiers have quietly receded in prominence. Yet, as artificial intelligence continues to redefine nearly every aspect of professional life, human resources experts are already forecasting a radically different kind of quota on the horizon — one not intended to balance representation among social categories, but rather to safeguard the collective participation of the human race itself.
During its HR Symposium in London this Tuesday, analysts from the global research leader Gartner presented a provocative projection: by the year 2032, as many as 30 percent of the world’s largest and most economically powerful nations will impose formal requirements ensuring a defined minimum level of human contribution within their national workforces. These mandates, described as “certified human quotas,” would require verifiable and measurable human involvement in production cycles, decision-making processes, and creative or strategic initiatives, all in response to the accelerating integration of AI into business operations.
Ania Krasniewska, Gartner’s Group Vice President, explained to Business Insider in an on-site interview that the firm’s conclusions stemmed from extensive cross-study analyses conducted by various Gartner research teams. According to her, the central motivation behind these impending regulations is straightforward yet profound: to affirm that human beings continue to hold a meaningful and accountable role in the creation, governance, and interpretation of work, even as automation becomes exponentially more dominant. She noted, however, that this transformation would not arise from internal corporate reforms or voluntary programs. Instead, it would be catalyzed by external legislative action, compelling organizations to adopt new frameworks for compliance and to establish transparent systems for proving how displaced or restructured employees are being redeployed within the enterprise.
Krasniewska’s observations coincide with recent legal developments hinting at the global reach of this shift. In August, Australia’s High Court ruled that the Fair Work Commission possesses the authority to investigate whether an employer could have mitigated job redundancies by reorganizing its workflow rather than simply eliminating positions. The particular case involved a company accused of laying off employees while simultaneously outsourcing their responsibilities to external contractors. The ruling, although specific in its origin, carries broader implications: it implicitly creates accountability for employers to examine — and document — whether human workers could have been reallocated before resorting to automation or external hires.
“This kind of precedent,” Krasniewska remarked, “is precisely the type of legislation we anticipate becoming more common in the next decade.” She added that as artificial intelligence continues to generate larger portions of output across industries, particularly in cognitive or analytical fields, businesses will be compelled to revisit one of the most delicate questions of the digital era: who bears responsibility for the consequences of AI-generated work that proves to be flawed or misleading?
She illustrated this dilemma with the example of medical imaging, a domain where AI already plays a critical role in assisting diagnoses. If a machine reads a scan, a physician acts on that interpretation, and it later emerges that the algorithmic judgment was erroneous, who is ultimately accountable — the doctor, the healthcare institution, or the developers behind the AI system? This uncertainty underscores the growing necessity of maintaining what experts call a “human in the loop” approach. The European Union’s AI Act, for instance, enshrines this principle by mandating a “meaningful” degree of human supervision in any high-risk AI system. The intent is to ensure that a qualified person can intervene promptly whenever algorithmic decisions threaten public safety, endanger fundamental rights, or could lead to significant ethical violations.
However, even such safeguards are not infallible. A case that unfolded this week vividly demonstrates these limitations: Deloitte, one of the world’s preeminent professional services firms, agreed to partially reimburse the Australian government after submitting a report riddled with inaccuracies — including citations referring to nonexistent academics and even a fabricated judicial quotation. The firm later admitted that artificial intelligence tools were used to assist in drafting the report, revealing the potential pitfalls of insufficient oversight in AI-augmented processes.
Krasniewska emphasized that for organizations to navigate such challenges effectively, transparency mechanisms must evolve in parallel with AI usage. Businesses, she advised, should develop meticulous systems capable of tracing where human judgment influenced a piece of work and where algorithmic assistance was employed. Techniques such as metadata tagging, digital watermarks, or annotated citations could help identify the human or AI source of information, ensuring accountability at every step. She further predicted that governmental bodies or public advocacy groups might soon demand clear disclosure policies to prevent confusion or mistrust surrounding AI-generated content.
“Most organizations,” she concluded, “have not yet looked far enough into the future to anticipate how such transparency will become a normative expectation rather than an afterthought. Yet there is something deeply human about recognizing the need to trace and publicly articulate the journey from point A to point B — to explain how, exactly, decisions and creations came to be.” Her insights encapsulate a defining tension of the contemporary workplace: as machines increasingly shoulder responsibility for tasks once handled by humans, the emerging challenge will not simply be to keep people involved, but to ensure that their engagement remains visible, verifiable, and valued.
Sourse: https://www.businessinsider.com/gartner-hr-experts-ai-changing-workplace-quotas-mandate-human-involvement-2025-10
