Companies are Implementing AI Digital Twins of Employees
The twin learns from meetings, documents, and correspondence and adopts the employee's thinking style.
Companies have started using digital twins of employees to increase productivity and reduce reliance on hiring, writes devby.io. One such example is Richard Skellett, Chief Analyst for Research and Design at the consulting firm Bloor Research. In an interview with the BBC, he revealed that he had created a digital copy of himself over three years. Technologically, "Digital Richard" is a personal AI model, trained on a specific person's work data.
The twin is trained on meetings, documents, and correspondence and imitates the owner's thinking style, helping to make decisions and prepare presentations. The result is a text interface — essentially, a chat with one's own digital copy, which can be consulted for advice, analytics, and assistance.
The system has separate tabs, such as "family" and "admin," access to which is restricted for colleagues — they can only consult the digital twin on business-related matters.
Over time, "Digital Richard" became the basis for scaling the technology within Bloor Research: based on his model, digital twins were created for the entire team of approximately 50 employees in the UK, Europe, USA, and India.
Bloor Research states that the technology assists in HR policy: for example, gradually retiring people or temporarily replacing colleagues — without hiring temporary employees. Another 20 companies are already testing this technology, and it will be widely available to others by the end of this year.
A similar approach is used by Josh Bersin, founder of the consulting firm The Josh Bersin Company. He calls this technology a "super-employee" — when AI enhances human capabilities. "People don't have the energy for another call. But you can wake up a digital twin in the middle of the night and talk to it for an hour — it doesn't care. That's incredibly valuable," he explains.
According to Bersin, thanks to digital copies of employees, the company grows by approximately 30% per year, but only hires one or two new specialists annually. "The economic value of each person is growing. If you become a valuable digital asset to the company, why shouldn't it pay you more?" he adds.
However, along with the advantages, serious questions also arise. Experts debate who owns the digital twin — the employee or the employer — and who is responsible for its actions.
"Once AI is trained on an individual's emails, meetings, and work materials, you are confronted with questions at the very heart of employment relationships: consent, control over personal data, job displacement, and what happens when an individual leaves the company," notes lawyer Anjali Malik of Bellevue Law.
Gartner analysts predict that digital twins of employees could become a widespread phenomenon in the near future. But while the market is still forming, legal regulations are not keeping pace with the technology. "I think we are more likely to see the negative side of this coin first, before the positive aspects emerge," warns Gartner researcher Kaitlin Lowmaster.
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