Technology is dramatically changing manyaspects of our lives — including how we work. Many organizationsand industries are looking to automate tasks or entire positions,which can make technology seem threatening for workers. A newreport from WorkMarket looks at different attitudes towardautomation and examines how this trend could change the businessworld.

For one thing, there's a notable difference between employersand employees when it comes to views on automation. More than halfof business leaders (52%) are interested in automating some part oftheir workforce, while one-third of employees described themselvesas indifferent.

IT is one of the areas where automation is likely to have thebiggest impact. Almost half of business leaders (43%) and nearly athird of employees (29%) cited IT and technology issues as thetasks that most often distract them from their work. AfterIT/technology, the tasks listed as keeping employees from focusingon more important aspects of their job include scheduling meetings,expense management, assigning work to eternal contributors,processing raw data, time entry, and billing/accounting tasks. Thereport found that these types of tasks are also often easilyautomated, and have the potential to give people more time back intheir work day.

In fact, saving time is a key factor for those who supportautomation in the workplace. Fifty-three percent of employeesinterviewed said they believe they could save up to two hours a dayif certain tasks were automated, and most business leaders agree,with almost 80% saying they'd likely save up to three hours of timea day.

But there are other advantages to automation besides savingtime. The vast majority of people who completed the survey (90%)said automation would improve their organization when it comes toreducing manual errors, speeding up task completion and betterquality product.

And employers and employees alike believe there is a place forautomation within their organization. Seventy four percent said atleast part of their current job could be automated.

Looking to the future, it appears automation is on the horizonfor a growing number of companies. More than half of businessleaders said they plan to implement automation technology in somepart of their company in the next three to five years.