Employees adopting AI faster than organisations, says McKinsey survey

While artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as the top technology spending priority for many organisations, most are still at an early stage of AI deployment, with employees adapting to the technology faster than the organisations they work for, according to a McKinsey survey.

The survey said leaders are introducing AI tools for employees and automating manual processes while encouraging workers to develop new technical skills. However, the outcomes have so far fallen short of expectations.

“Results are still falling short of leaders’ ambitions,” the report said.

According to McKinsey, organisations are at different stages of AI transformation, with many yet to convert individual AI-driven productivity gains into enterprise-wide impact.

“Given how rapidly AI capabilities are evolving, it is not surprising that organisations are still learning how to translate individual productivity gains into enterprise-level impact,” the report said.

The report said AI adoption alone does not create lasting enterprise value. While AI improves individual productivity, organisations need to fundamentally change the way they operate to achieve sustained competitive advantage.

The survey found that 70 per cent of respondents feel personally prepared to adopt and use AI. However, only 27 per cent of leaders believe their organisations are ready for the structural and cultural changes required for an agentic AI future.

According to the report, employees are adapting to AI much faster than the organisations they work for, a trend that is consistent with McKinsey’s earlier research.

“The challenge is not AI adoption by employees, but how leaders can drive organisational changes to capture value,” the report said.

The survey noted that employees are increasingly using AI for tasks such as drafting emails, summarising meetings, analysing data, creating presentations and preparing for client or leadership interactions. However, these individual productivity gains have not yet translated into organisation-wide transformation, with many companies continuing to operate largely as before.

The report further said most organisations are still developing the capabilities needed to unlock enterprise-wide value from AI. It added that 84 per cent of leaders in the enablement stage and 68 per cent in the automation stage said they were unprepared for the people and cultural changes required for an agentic AI future.