The AI Challenge for PI and DM professionals

If you are a professional in personal injury and disability management (PI/DM), return-to-work (RTW) coordination or related fields, Artificial Intelligence (AI) brings new challenges. The advantages of using AI are clear: new insights, expedited workflow management, and improved communication leading to better outcomes for clients.

Optimizing client outcomes is fundamental to the profession. Failing to use AI tools—or failing to use them appropriately—run counter to the profession’s objectives.

AI Literacy and Use in PI/DM

In speaking on AI and PI/DM for the last two years, I have encountered apprehension among professionals in this field. At a recent Canadian Society of Professionals in Disability Management (CSDPM) event, I asked the audience to respond to four questions. The live “vote” (n=254) results are revealing:

• Do you use the internet most days? 98% yes
• Do you consciously interact with artificial intelligence (AI) most days? 48% yes
• Does your organization have a well understood policy or guideline for the use of AI? 38%  yes
•  Are you using AI in your professional DM work? 30% yes

While nearly universal daily internet use, less than half report consciously interacting with AI and less than a third are using (or admitting use) of AI in their professional work.

A lack of AI literacy may account for this low level of engagement.

AI Literacy, Transparency, and Use

AI literacy refers to the ability to critically understand, responsibly use, and effectively evaluate artificial intelligence tools and systems. This is not just technical knowledge; AI literacy requires ethical awareness, contextual judgment, and transparent communication about AI’s role in shaping information, decision-making, and practice.

Transparency is important. From their formal training, most PI/DM professionals are aware of academic integrity rules particularly around plagiarism, but AI use requires a distinct set of rules.

As an instructor, I allow the use of AI tools in my courses and require an AI Attestation with acknowledging the use and extent (if any) of AI tools in formal assignment submissions.   I do not encounter many examples of plagiarism, but I am seeing what I call “plagi-AI-ism,” the use of AI tools to generate or significantly shape content, without proper acknowledgment of the AI’s role.  This lack of transparency runs counter to academic integrity and professionalism.

To be clear, the appropriate and transparent use of AI tools — such as language refinement, citation help, or idea generation — is encouraged and allowed if properly disclosed. Plagi-AI-ism refers only to non-transparent, misleading use of AI that obscures authorship, intellectual effort or critical professional considerations.

A recent KPMG/University of Melbourne study (Gillespie, N., Lockey, S., Ward, T., Macdade, A., & Hassed, G. (2025). Trust, attitudes, and use of artificial intelligence: A global study 2025. The University of Melbourne and KPMG. DOI 10.26188/28822919) found Australia, Canada, and New Zealand have among the lowest levels of training, literacy, and trust in artificial intelligence systems in the world.

AI education and training is reaching about 24% of the population in these countries, lagging slightly behind the US (28%) and well behind China and India (64%), Singapore and Switzerland (45%), and Denmark and Italy (34%) as well as dozens of other countries.

AI adoption in the workplace

The use of AI at work is growing. The KPMG/UofM study notes:

“Three in five (58%) employees intentionally use AI at work on a regular basis, with a third using it weekly. Generative AI tools are most used with many employees opting for free, publicly available tools rather than employer-provided options. Emerging economies are leading in employee adoption with 72% using AI regularly compared to 49% in advanced economies.”

AI use by knowledge workers (including professionals in PIDM, RTW, HR) may well be significantly higher. A study by Microsoft and LinkedIn (Microsoft and LinkedIn, 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report, May 8, 2024, https://news.microsoft.com/2024/05/08/microsoft-and-linkedin-release-the-2024-work-trend-index-on-the-state-of-ai-at-work/) found:

• •       75% of global knowledge workers use AI at Work—and won’t wait for companies to catch up.
• •       78% of AI users are bringing their own AI tools to work (BYOAI)—it’s even more common at small and medium-sized companies (80%).
• •       52% of people who use AI at work are reluctant to admit to using it for their most important tasks.

AI is everywhere.

Part of the lower-than-expected results from my recent survey may be due to a lack of awareness about the prevalence of AI technologies in the tools used by professional in DM and related fields. To be clear, AI is everywhere professionals; consciously or not, PI/DM professionals are interacting with AI. Ignoring it or banning its use on the job is not an option.

If you use the internet most days—as two-thirds of humanity do—you are interacting with AI. AI is built into most office software.  Search engine results are mediated by AI.  Every time you complete a CAPTCHA, you are advancing AI.  When you hear the call centre message, “Your call may be monitored for training purposes,” there is a good chance your interaction is helping train AI.

AI is pervasive and evolving.  PI/DM professionals must keep pace. AI literacy is central to this task.

Setting rules around AI

Universities have rules about the use of AI and academic integrity is an imperative; yet the KPMG/UofM study found:

• Most students have used AI inappropriately, contravening rules and guidelines and over-relying on AI.
• Two-thirds have not been transparent in their AI use, presenting AI-generated content as their own and hiding their use of AI tools.
• Only half regularly engage critically with AI tools and their output.

While 38% of respondent in my survey said their organization had a well understood policy or guideline for the use of AI, the well understood policy was often a blanket “Don’t use AI.”  For these professionals, many AI chatbots are off limits and certain functions on corporate workstations have administrator restrictions.

Despite controls and policies like this, the KPMG/UoM study found “a third (35%) of employees report that the use of AI tools has resulted in increased compliance and privacy risks, such as contravening rules, policies and local laws.” 

AI enabled apps such as Microsoft 365 with CoPilot are typically approved for PI/DM professionals in corporate settings. In probing their actual use, respondents (often) reluctantly confirm the Microsoft/LinkedIn survey result:  DM professionals are using personal devices to augment approved use.

This is level of use is similar in other professional settings. The Queensland University of Technology study (McDonald, P., Hay, S., Cathcart, A. & Feldman, A. (2024). Apostles, Agnostics and Atheists: Engagement with Generative AI by Australian University Staff. Brisbane: QUT Centre for Decent Work and Industry. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/252079) found 71% of university staff respondents used generative AI for their university work.

• Academic staff (75%)
• Professional staff (69%)
• Sessional staff (62%)
• Senior staff (81%)

 The Growth of In-house AI Solution

Many insurers, agencies, rehabilitation providers are now developing their own AI solutions. The rationale for such investments includes the primacy of client confidentiality, competitive advantage, improvements in efficiency, and better outcomes for clients.

In conversation with three senior executives working on their own AI solutions, the obstacles are clear. The time, training, and human resource allocation efforts are immense, and the payoffs are often incremental, at least initially, compared to the cost and effort.

Liberty Mutual reports productivity gains of 1.5 hours per week for the 25% of employees now using their LibertyGPT system. Manulife notes the gains in fraud detection, underwriting, and claims support. Several firms are using AI to train new agents and call centre representatives. A few are now rolling out internally developed agentic AI systems to work with and, in some cases, replace humans doing more routine tasks.

Implications

Governance, board,  and C-suite leadership have a significant issue. Most organizations do not have a formal AI strategy. You need one. And do not expect it to be easy to develop, cheap to implement, or finite in terms of consideration. This is not a “one and done” agenda item.

Administrators have a tough task ahead of them. Chances are many of your professionals are already using AI, skirting any formal policy you may have and pushing the boundaries where policy or guidelines are lacking. You have regulatory imperatives and may be facing a talent crush amid other priorities including budgetary constraints.

PI/DM professionals have enduring professional priorities including.

• The health, well-being, and best interests of the client
• Maintaining ethical standards and accountability
• Continuing Mastery of DM’s evolving knowledge base
• Adapting proactively to changes in environment and evolving technology landscape.

AI technologies are at the nexus of these professional responsibilities. Increasing AI literacy is fundamental to meeting professionalism.

Improving AI Literacy levels

The KPMG/UofM study highlights this fundamental relationship:

“AI literacy is lagging AI adoption yet is critical for responsible and effective use…AI literacy. is associated with greater use, trust, acceptance, and critical engagement, and more realized benefits from AI use including more performance benefits in the workplace.”

In PI/DM, performance benefits in the workplace translate directly to better service deliver and outcomes to clients.

That begs the question:  how does a professional in personal injury and disability management improve AI literacy?

The QuT study asked AI-user respondents what resources they used to learn about AI tools, or AI more generally. The results were revealing. Informal sources including peers, colleagues, family, or friends topped the list (61.3%); Google searches were the course for half the respondents and (46.6%), YouTube videos were a source for a third of respondents (32.1%). Responses listing formal sources for gaining AI literacy ranked much lower:  conferences or seminars (16.9%), workshops (13.2%) and blog posts like this one (12.5%). Only eight of the 2315 (0.4%) responses noted their degree or qualification curriculum as a resource.

If those results do not scare you, consider the misuse potential inherent in untrained use of AI tools. AI tools are not without limitations and risks. Professionals in all fields are responsible for selecting the right tool for the job, understanding the inherent risks associated with that tool, and having mastery of the tool before employing it in the execution of their work. Without formal training and integration of AI literacy into professional development and qualifications, there is the real risk of harm to clients.

Final thoughts for professionals

AI is here and not going away.  PI/DM professionals must evolve with AI technology and improving AI literacy is part of that. 

Learn about AI but not just from YouTube videos.  Engage in courses and sessions that provide formal, authoritative instruction.  Align your use of AI with the values of the profession.  Anticipate how others are using AI in the products or instructions you receive and be conscious of how others will use AI with the work you produce and services you provide.  Think critically.  AI does not replace your professional judgement.  You must be aware of the imitations and weaknesses of the tools you use.  And with any changing field, you need to stay informed. Where possible, be part of the processes setting standards and guidance for the use of AI in your profession.

To paraphrase a recent IBM study, AI won’t replace PI/DM professionals but PI/DM professional who use AI will replace those who don’t. [IBM Institute for Business Value | Research Insights, 2023, “Augmented work for an automated, AI-driven world”]

The Future of Workers’ Compensation: Changing Times, Persistent Issues

 

At a recent personal injury/disability management conference, a panel moderator told delegates, “The topics on our agenda today are strikingly similar to those on the conference agenda from a decade ago” (Rebecca Harris, GM Regulatory Services WorkCover WA at PIEF Conference, Perth:  October 2024 [paraphrased]).     

Her statement resonated with my own experience attending workers’ compensation conferences in each of the past five decades.  Many of the issues facing workers’ compensation systems are perennial; the relative priority and details change with the times, but the themes are enduring. 

The lead agenda items from the 1954 International Association of Industrial Accident Boards and Commissions (IAIABC) Conference 70 years could appear on any workers’ compensation conference held today: 

• Rehabilitation of Injured Workers
• Problems and Methods of Handling Small Risks and Excluded Employees Who May Want Voluntary Coverage
• Adequacy of Workmen's Compensation
• Occupational Cancer Hazards

The keynote speaker at the 1954 IAIABC conference in Quebec was the then Under Secretary of the U. S. Department of Labor, Arthur Larson.  The conference was themed around “Workmen’s Compensation Problems” and Larson’s keynote was entitled “The Future of Workmen’s Compensation”. 

Larson had recently completed his master work on workers’ compensation law (Larson, A. (1952) Workmen’s compensation law. Matthew Bender) and was concerned about the deficiencies and inconsistencies in the current (1954) state of workers’ compensation.  Many of those concerns align with issues facing workers’ compensation in 2025.

Inconsistent Benefits Across Jurisdictions.

Variations in coverage across states and provinces were “a grave and growing concern” for Larson.  The variation in the compensation rate for temporary disability, the absence of full indexing of permanent benefits, and uneven compensation for fatalities are contemporary issues in today’s workers compensation landscape.  Larson was aware of the legislative differences among US states and Canadian provinces (acknowledging greater consistency in Canada) and some of these differences were highlighted in his speech.    

Coverage Gaps

Larson noted, “Elective-coverage provisions, and hazardous-employment requirements, inspired by ancient fears of unconstitutionality, have long since been proved unnecessary… but remain with us to deprive large numbers of people of needed protection.”  His comments were focused on agriculture, small business workers, and many occupational diseases not covered. Gaps in coverage continue to exist.  In Canada, where half the jurisdictions cover well over 90% of the employed labour force, six jurisdictions cover a far lower percentage (ranging from about 70 to 80%) of the employed labour force. In the US, there are gaps in coverage for gig workers, independent contractors, and remote workers face uncertainty in coverage.

Inadequate Benefits & Duration

Larson was very concerned about equity.  He states, “A system which has been assigned the function of taking care of income loss due to industrial disability has no right to stop payments to a totally permanently disabled man after 8 or 10 or 15 years.”  Today, the growing participation rate of older workers and increased longevity accentuate the inequity of age-limited compensation; compensation for catastrophic injures is inadequate in many jurisdictions.  Although all but one Canadian province has eliminated waiting periods and most provide wage replacement at 85-90% of net (spendable) earnings, many US jurisdictions limit benefits through maximums on payments or insured earnings forcing workers to bear much more of the financial loss than the grand bargain of workers’ compensation was supposed to provide.

Medical & Rehabilitation Challenges

In Larson’s 1950’s context, there was a burgeoning of medical and rehabilitation knowledge.  “Entire new worlds of knowledge have been opened up on such matters as physical and vocational rehabilitation, and medical techniques for minimizing the disabling effects of injury, with relatively little parallel development of compensation law.”  His concerns are echoed today where many jurisdictions provide little or no access to vocational rehabilitation.  Critics often complain about the lag in workers’ compensation recognizing certain medical treatments including the use of medical marijuana and psycho active drugs; rules regarding treatment and care particularly for mental injuries and limits on graduated return-to-work initiatives often seem arbitrary and inconsistent with the nature of mental injuries in particular.

Externalization of costs  

Larson emphasizes the need for workers’ compensation to pay for the costs of work-related injury, disease and death. He opposes externalization to public assistance or other social insurance.  This also speaks to the adequacy and sufficiency of the benefit levels paid to workers.  Larson was clear,  “The products of this area are sold all over the world ; the cost of workmen's compensation goes into the price of these products and is borne by consumers everywhere; yet the voters and property owners of that city and State go on bearing the cost of public relief in the form of local taxes for a burden that is supposed to be borne by the consumers of the product.”

Federalization versus State/Provincial Control

Larson believed workers’ compensation was best administered at the state level. He noted Canadian provinces were strongly oriented in this fashion.  State/provincial control of workers’ compensation is not universal; the US, Canada, and Australia are the exceptions to the general rule of national programs.  Larson cited from his previous speech in Boston on the same topic:  

"We should adhere to State responsibility for the system, and not succumb to the temptation of federalization… I believe that workmen's compensation should remain a State matter”

Larson decried the disparities among jurisdictions, particularly those providing the least coverage. There have been efforts at harmonizing compensation  or establishing national standards (see John F. Burton’s 1972 Report of the National Commission on State Workmen’s Compensation Laws), but as I have shown in previous posts, few US jurisdictions meet or exceed its recommended levels of compensation.  Other comparative studies of workers’ compensation laws report the differences and make disparities quite apparent, but don’t set standards (see tables at AWCBC.org, Comparison of Workers’ Compensation Arrangements in Australia and New Zealand 2023, NASI’s Workers’ Compensation Benefits, Costs and Coverage – based on 2022 data, particularly Appendix D, which summarizes IAIABC/WCRI’s report on State Workers’ Compensation Laws).

Extraterritorial & Jurisdictional Issues

As Larson put it, “Interstate operations, in transportation, construction, selling, and the like have increased greatly, while compensation provisions on extraterritorial coverage and jurisdiction remain as chaotic and jumbled as ever.”  With remote workers, mobile workers, and now digital nomads working from remote cabins, cruise ships, and caravans through satellite access, the concept of the “workplace” has changed dramatically.  More workers travel across jurisdictional lines from home to work, and some have multiple jobs in two or more jurisdictions.  Questions regarding jurisdictional issues remain with many concerns over workers falling through the cracks in coverage or being overwhelmed by the jurisdictional requirements.  Many are forced to elect the jurisdiction to consider their options and complete forms at a time when they simply need treatment and funding to survive.  While there are some inter-jurisdictional agreements (see AWCBC-IJA as an example), there are still gaps including those digital nomads, remote workers working outside of or across multiple jurisdictions.

The Role of Public Assistance & Safety Nets

“Workmen’s compensation was supposed to make public assistance unnecessary; but in some areas a considerable fraction of compensation recipients are driven to seek public assistance to bring their benefits up to a subsistence level.”  Larson saw the policy ideal but recognized compensation levels were often inadequate.  The consequences include inconsistent rules regarding access to other social insurance schemes, reduced benefits and offsets as well as confusing differences across jurisdictions remain.   

Workplace Safety & Emerging Risks

Larson’s speech predate OSHA’s formation in 1971 so his focus was more on the insurance side of workers’ compensation.  He certainly was aware of workplace safety and the need to identify emerging risks.  “New diseases and new hazards have come with new industries and processes,” said Larson, noting that legislation makes little or no provisions for quick adaptations and inclusions, noting only “piecemeal amendments and sporadic revisions”.  Transportation network “gig” workers did not exist in the past and we are in the midst of deciding jurisdiction by jurisdiction whether the workers in this industry will be in or out of coverage.  Occupational disease coverage remains a contentious issue with uneven coverage, especially for conditions like PTSD and long-latency illnesses (e.g., cancer, long COVID). Larson would recognize the challenge Covid-19 created for workers’ compensation systems; whether he judge the response in terms of new presumptions a consistent response is open to debate.

Purposeful Leadership and Focus

Larson sought to inspire the leadership of workers’ compensation systems present at the Quebec conference.  He understood the need for greater understanding in the broader community about the purpose of workers compensation. “I would like to see the name of the whole system changed from Workmen's Compensation to Workmen's Restoration …. The purpose would be to dramatize the fact that the system no longer should be satisfied to "compensate" in the sense of paying off or buying off the injury; it should now recognize an obligation to make the injured workman whole, to restore him to health and useful employment, through careful medical attention, and through systematic physical and vocational rehabilitation.” 

While no system has adopted Larson’s proposal, many have renamed their systems or significant programs under their legislative mandate to align with his intent, shifting the focus away from compensation and towards prevention and return to work.  The “WorkSafe” moniker (emphasising these authorities’ roles in occupational health and safety both in primary prevention and safe return to work) has been adopted in British Columbia and New Brunswick in Canada, Victoria and Tasmania in Australia, and by some specific programs run by or with the workers’ compensation programs in Montana and Saskatchewan. South Australia’s WorkCover corporation rebranded in 2015 as ReturnToWorkSouthAustralia. [Larson would likely approve]. 

Recurring themes

At that recent PIEF conference, Rebecca Harris moderated a “Leadership Perspective” panel.  The discussion included the need for “purposeful leadership” and the need to engage stakeholders, increasing their understanding of workers’ compensation and the issues we collectively face, and the need moral authority/ social capital to operate in the workers’ compensation space.  I’m certain anyone in workers’ compensation would recognize echoes from the themes in Larson’s 1954 speech. 

The full text of Larson’s address is contained in  “Workmen's Compensation Problems, 1954: Proceedings--40th Annual Convention of the International Association of Industrial Accident Boards and Commissions, Quebec, Canada, October 3-7, 1954, Issue 180” on Google Books.  I could not locate an actual recording of Larson’s address, but I have linked an AI synthesized [Speechify] audio version of Arthur Anderson’s 1954 IAIABC Address- The Future of Workmen’s Compensation.