Guest Post: Reese Ramos on the Impact of AI

In this special post, Reese Ramos, the University Ombuds & Director at Virginia Tech, offers his perspective on the growing impact of AI on Ombuds work. I deeply appreciate and respect his insights on the Ombuds profession.

Here is his full essay:

Crystal Ball* on the Impact of Artificial Intelligence in our
Ombuds Practice (as of Fall 2025) by Reese Ramos 

I was listening to a tech expert on a podcast the other day and they indicated their belief that the singularity, where artificial intelligence reaches a point of super intelligence, might not be an event in the future and that we may actually be in the middle of the singularity. In the words of “the One”, also known as Neo from the Matrix, “whoa”. Whether or not we are in the event horizon of super-intelligence or not, here are some ripple effects of the current evolution AI is having on our organizations and the need to adapt our Ombuds practices to the changing landscape:

• Employee morale may decrease even more as massive jobs loss in all sectors and institutions occur because AI systems are put in place that replace certain tasks currently done by humans (as of this writing Amazon is planning on replacing over 600k employees in their warehouses with robots and Salesforce earlier this year cut over 4k customer service jobs as AI agents replace those roles)
• Uncertainty as anxiety and fear around “everyone’s jobs” being replaced by AI 
• Employees being disciplined as they are unwilling to see the value of utilizing and being trained in AI usage (e.g., too complex, feeling that they are training their replacement, seems too “sci-fi”). Coinbase, this summer 2025, terminated engineers that had not used AI 
• As certain tasks are replaced by AI (scheduling, research, data analysis, presentation creation, etc.) employees will feel pressure to be more efficient as their focus turns to “higher-level work” and having to justify the institution’s Return on Investment (ROI) in them 
• Position descriptions needing to change because of the evolution of AI and employees pushing back claiming that the job expectations now expected of them are not what they “signed” up for 
• The need for Ombuds to help individuals and organizations better manage adapting to change
• New job categories being created (e.g., “prompt engineer”, “AI learning coach”) 
• Institutions will shift into utilizing predictive analytics for admissions, hiring, retention, and performance evaluations, raising questions of possible bias, mistakes, etc. by AI
• Policies and expectations will need to be adopted around the appropriate use of AI by employees, students, contractors, etc. 
• AI surveillance in the workplace will be utilized to monitor employee’s presence, work efficiency, work- load, etc. and in turn, raising privacy concerns
• Increase in data and IP ownership debates in the workplace
• Human judgment decreasing because of the over-reliance on AI tools 
• Ability for some community members, not just those with a disability, to engage more and be included because of transcription, accessibility tools, and translation apps that make it easier to engage, communicate and comprehend
• Ombuds needing to adopt policies and practices that manage confidentiality as AI wearables with the ability to record conversations become the norm
• Ownership of AI-generated content will challenge existing copyright, authorship, and academic integrity frameworks
• AI “assistants” will advise students and employees on coursework, career paths, and professional development, displacing academic advisors, career advisors, and even some managers as organizations structurally flatten out 
• As AI “hallucinates” and generates seemingly accurate but incorrect data, inaccurate information and false research, new verification safeguards will need to be implemented 

* For anyone unfamiliar with Mary Rowe’s “Crystal Ball,” it’s worth looking at the October 2010 issue of the Journal of the International Ombudsman Association (Vol. 3, No. 2). In that piece, Rowe, who served as MIT’s Ombuds for more than four decades before retiring, explains that the Crystal Ball originated in 1984 as a way for Organizational Ombuds to reflect on and prepare for particular types of conflicts. Over time, the practice evolved into a prompt that helped Ombuds surface emerging issues and identify opportunities for broader systemic improvements.

Related posts: Guest Post: The Thread that Unites Us All – A Celebration of Ombuds Day*; The Power of Speaking Up: Thoughts On Ombuds Day (Guest Post); (Guest Post) Navigating the Ripple Effects of a New Presidential Administration with the Crystal Ball.

See also: Simulation Labs Offers AI Chat to Practice Ombuds Skills; ENOHE Webinar to Explore AI and Ombuds Work; Maybe AI Chatbots Won't Replace Ombuds; Ombuds for Northern Virginia Community College Adopts AI Statement.