The CIO's Trust Paradox: Your Team May Be More Honest with AI Than with You
CIO, Friday, November 6th, 2026
Employees may voice concerns more freely to AI than to leaders, so CIOs need ways to bring those concerns into real decisions.
In his Second Opinion column for CIO, Khalid Kark argues that psychological safety works best when paired with accountability, citing research showing that safety without accountability can hurt performance on routine work.
He notes studies finding that psychological safety did not predict trust in AI and that AI adoption can lower psychological safety.
Experiments suggest employees are more willing to challenge an algorithmic leader than a human one, so concerns may reach an AI assistant but never the organization.
He recommends keeping safety constant while tightening accountability by phase, measuring whether dissent actually changes decisions, and giving employees a simple way to escalate concerns raised with AI.