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Months after our last AI survey, senior leaders tell us they’re continuing to put money into the technology — and getting more return on their investment, across a range of use cases from employee productivity and cybersecurity to product innovation.
This may not be the narrative you’re hearing in the media. And it’s also not the full story.
Foundational elements of AI transformations — whether in upgrading data infrastructures, training employees, building out responsible AI practices, and addressing the impact of higher energy usage on sustainability — remain a persistent and often overlooked need. And as agentic AI, the next evolution of AI, continues to evolve, these topics are even more important to get right — now.
Leaders are banking on AI as the future, but our research uncovered challenges like data infrastructure are already holding back adoption. Leaders must put emerging and evolving risks like data and change management at the top of their AI transformation agenda to maintain momentum.
Five key takeaways
Survey respondents are significantly more likely to tell us that they’ve seen a positive ROI from AI investments — even more so when their organizations have a budget for AI investments that is 5% or more of their total budget, compared against those whose budget is less than 5%.
Action item for executives
Explore partnerships and alliances in a time of squeezed budgets and reduced M&A.
Yet senior leaders also reveal that ROI from AI initiatives could have been even better.
Action item for executives
Prioritize building out data infrastructure, with an eye toward constant improvement.
With great power comes great responsibility. As their AI initiatives pay dividends, senior leaders must confront the ethical implications and risks — as such, they say their interest in responsible AI has increased over the past year (61% today vs. 53% six months ago). And, by nearly the same margin, respondents say that interest will continue to increase over the next year. As a result, significantly more organizations say they have spent more time on training employees in responsible AI and are increasing transparency with customers on how AI is used.
Action item for executives
Determine responsible AI principles backed by governance and humans in the loop.
Slightly more report that their employees are feeling overwhelmed or exhausted by the constant influx of AI information and developments.
Action item for executives
Make AI training and communication worthwhile for employees to engage in, not disengage from.
Another challenge directly relates to costs and sustainability: The data centers that enable AI use a lot of energy. Senior executives say they are worried.
Action item for executives
Build on sustainability plans for a new era (not disregard them) as the need for power grows.
Summary
Amid this complex brew of increased ROI, steady investment, elevated employee and leadership fatigue, and inconsistent foundational requirements, executives cannot overlook key focus areas to boost AI adoption and accelerate capabilities — and results. As the GenAI hype train went into overdrive, some executives forgot about the change management and process transformation that is necessary in every transformation.
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