Your organization spent millions on Workday partly because of its AI capabilities. Workday Illuminate is already in your tenant, powered by 800 billion business transactions. The Workday Assistant can answer employee questions in natural language. AI agents can automate recruiting, expenses, and succession planning.
But here's what we see across implementations: most organizations have no idea these capabilities exist, let alone how to activate them. They're paying for enterprise AI while their HR teams still manually answer the same benefits questions, recruiters still chase candidates through email, and finance teams still reconcile expense reports line by line.
Align's AI Activation Assessment exists specifically to close this gap — helping organizations understand what they already own, identify which AI capabilities solve their actual problems, and build realistic adoption plans that don't require data science degrees.
What We See
Across implementations, we see consistent patterns when it comes to Workday AI:
Why This Matters Right Now
The cost of leaving Workday AI inactive isn't just about unused features. It shows up as:
- HR teams spending hours answering repetitive employee questions that Workday Assistant could handle instantly
- Recruiters drowning in administrative tasks while their AI-powered Recruiter Agent sits unused
- Finance teams manually processing expense reports when automation exists in their tenant
- Managers making succession decisions without the AI-driven insights already available to them
- Organizations paying subscription costs for capabilities they never activate
Meanwhile, other organizations using the same Workday tenant are seeing measurable improvements. They're reducing HR ticket volume, accelerating recruiting cycles, cutting expense processing time, and improving manager effectiveness — not through custom development or additional purchases, but by activating what they already own.
5 Questions That Reveal Your AI Readiness
If you can't answer these questions clearly, you're likely sitting on unused AI capability:
- Can you list which Workday AI features are currently active in your tenant?
If the answer is "I'm not sure" or "probably none," you're not alone — but you're missing opportunities. - Do your employees know they can ask Workday questions in plain language?
The Workday Assistant capability exists, but if no one knows it's there, it can't reduce your HR workload. - Are your recruiters aware of AI-powered candidate sourcing and outreach?
The Recruiter Agent can transform hiring speed, but only if your talent team knows it exists and how to use it. - Have you identified which manual processes AI could realistically automate?
Generic "AI will help us" enthusiasm doesn't drive adoption. Specific problem-solving does. - Do you have a plan for measuring AI impact beyond "we turned it on"?
Activation without measurement means you'll never know if it's working or why usage remains low.
The AI Activation Assessment
This is why Align built the AI Activation Assessment — to help organizations get practical value from AI capabilities they already own.
- Why this assessment exists:
Most organizations know they should be doing something with AI, but they don't know where to start. They need someone who understands both Workday's technical capabilities and real-world implementation patterns to help them separate hype from practical application. - What the assessment focuses on:
We evaluate your current state — which AI features are already active, which are sitting dormant, and which would actually solve problems your teams face today. We look at data readiness, change management capacity, and realistic adoption timeframes. Then we prioritize based on impact and feasibility, not just what sounds impressive. - How Align's approach is different:
We don't push AI for AI's sake. We've seen organizations activate every available feature and achieve nothing because they skipped the adoption work. Our approach starts with your actual pain points — manual processes that burden your teams, bottlenecks that slow your operations, questions that flood your HR inbox — and matches them to AI capabilities that can realistically help. We focus on practical wins, not proof-of-concept projects that never scale.
The Value of Getting This Right
When organizations actually activate and adopt their Workday AI capabilities, the benefits compound:
- Employees get instant answers to routine questions instead of waiting for HR responses
- Recruiters spend time on candidate relationships instead of administrative coordination
- Finance teams review exceptions instead of processing every expense report manually
- Managers make more informed talent decisions with AI-generated insights
- HR teams shift from reactive support to strategic work
- The organization gets measurable return on AI capabilities it's already paying for
This isn't about chasing the latest technology. It's about using what you already own to reduce friction, improve experiences, and free your teams to focus on work that actually requires human judgment.
Start With What You Already Own
Wondering what AI capabilities are sitting unused in your Workday tenant? The AI Activation Assessment identifies what's available, what's realistic for your organization, and where to start.
