Bank teller Kathryn Sullivan was unaware she was training a chatbot to do her work, before she was made redundant by Commonwealth Bank, ending her 25-year career.
It's an experience that pushed the 63-year-old to share her story at an AI symposium in Canberra on Wednesday.
Ms Sullivan said she welcomed technologies that could help provide better services, but she had no idea her job was on the line before being made redundant in July.
"I was completely shell-shocked, alongside my colleague," Ms Sullivan told AAP.
"We just feel like we were nothing, we were a number."
Ms Sullivan later opted for redundancy after the bank did a U-turn on the job cuts, offering employees their positions back weeks later.
The role offered to her was different to her original position, with no guarantee that it would remain secure, Ms Sullivan said.Â
At Wednesday's meeting, Australia's peak union body embraced a government push to harness artificial intelligence as a force for growth, while advocating for laws that businesses fear will stifle the technology.
Australian Council of Trade Unions assistant secretary Joseph Mitchell said there needed to be an agenda that empowered jobs, workers and growth through AI.
But an act ensuring employers and workers are consulted before new technologies are introduced, and protecting the work of creatives from large-scale tech company theft is essential, he argued.
There will be a need for employers to invest in training and education for workers impacted by AI, Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock said in a speech on Wednesday.
She predicted labour market disruptions as employers navigate developing technologies.
"That's why it is so important that we have a resilient and adaptable workforce," Ms Bullock said at the Shann Memorial Lecture in Perth.
"But some individuals are likely to need support through these disruptions."
The RBA was also embracing AI to enhance its capabilities, but was not using it to decide interest rates, she said.
Ms Bullock said the central bank was developing its own tool to provide research summaries, and make institutional knowledge more digestible for staff.
Workers' voices must remain at the centre of AI adoption, Assistant Productivity Minister Andrew Leigh assured unions at Wednesday's meeting.
"The Australian ideal of the 'fair go' means that prosperity is shared," he said, meaning "technology should serve people, not the other way around".
The minister welcomed AI as a force for good, describing the technology as a "once-in-a-generation chance" to restore workers' dignity after decades of rising inequality and casualisation.
Labor senator Tim Ayres raised questions about the extent Australia adopts technology from overseas, rather than shaping the landscape ourselves.
"How we co-operate and collaborate with our neighbours and partners and competitors on these questions is up for grabs," he told the meeting.
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