How much productive time disappears because somebody misheard an instruction, missed part of a meeting, or could not fully express an idea?
In this episode of AI at Work, I speak with Paul Lee, CEO of Bridge and InnoCaption, about communication friction and why it deserves greater attention in the workplace AI conversation.
Bridge provides AI-powered real-time captioning, transcription, translation, meeting summaries, and meeting intelligence. InnoCaption provides AI and human-powered telephone captioning for eligible Americans who are deaf, hard of hearing, or have a speech disability. Paul explains how the experience gained from captioning over 30 million calls is informing Bridge’s approach to workplace communication.
Research shared by Bridge says one in six working-age adults experiences hearing loss. It also reports that 37% of employees with hearing loss lose over five hours each week because of communication gaps, while nearly 20% lose over ten hours. Those losses can appear through repeated conversations, missed context, reworked tasks, and weaker decisions.
Paul introduces the curb cut effect, named after the sidewalk ramps created for wheelchair users that also help parents with strollers, cyclists, and travelers carrying luggage. He believes workplace captions can produce a similar result. Technology designed for people facing the greatest communication barriers can improve comprehension, attention, and recall across a much wider workforce.
We also discuss how accurate transcription can turn meetings into searchable company knowledge. Paul shares how his own team uses AI to consolidate brainstorming notes and reduce 100 ideas to a manageable set of choices. The system organizes the information, while people remain responsible for deciding what happens next.
Paul also considers multilingual collaboration, AI translation that preserves meaning and nuance, and why AI ROI should include decision quality, participation, knowledge retention, and product development speed alongside immediate time savings.
For business leaders, his advice is to understand work at the department, team, and individual levels before choosing a tool. Setting an arbitrary AI adoption target can create poor incentives, while studying repetitive tasks and employee frustrations can reveal where AI will offer genuine value.
Where is communication friction quietly consuming time inside your company, and could accessibility technology help everyone participate more fully? Listen to the conversation and share your thoughts with me.
