CEOs Embrace Generative AI

Learn more about IBM

Nearly half of CEOs surveyed identify productivity as their highest business priority — up from sixth place in 2022, according to CEO decision-making in the age of AI, Act with intention, a study conducted by the IBM Institute for Business Value.

They recognize technology modernization is key to achieving their productivity goals, ranking it as second highest priority. Yet, CEOs can face key barriers as they race to modernize and adopt new technologies like generative AI.

The study found that three-quarters of CEO respondents believe that competitive advantage will depend on who has the most advanced generative AI. However, executives are also weighing potential risks or barriers of the technology such as bias, ethics and security. More than half (57%) of CEOs surveyed are concerned about data security and 48% worry about bias or data accuracy.

There is also a disconnect between CEOs and their teams when it comes to AI readiness. Half (50%) of CEOs surveyed report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services, and 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions. Yet, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI; only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

"Generative AI can reduce the barriers to AI adoption and half of CEOs interviewed are actively exploring it to drive a new wave of productivity, efficiency and quality of service across industries," said Jesus Mantas, Global Managing Partner, IBM Consulting. "CEOs need to assess their company requirements around data privacy, intellectual property protection, security, algorithmic accountability and governance in order to plan their deployment of emerging use cases of generative AI at scale."

Additional findings include:

CEOs say productivity — and the driving technology — is a pressing priority

Almost half (48%) of CEOs surveyed pinpoint productivity as a top priority for their organization.

Technology modernization follows as their second highest priority (45%) but CEOs also indicate this is among their top challenges.

For the fourth consecutive year, CEOs surveyed say technology factors remain the top external force impacting their organization over the next three years.

CEOs increasingly look toward operational, technology and data leaders as strategic decision makers

When asked which C-Suite members will make the most crucial decisions over the next three years, CEO respondents identify COOs (62%) and CFOs (52%).

The influence of technology leaders on decision making is growing — 38% of surveyed CEOs point to CIOs (up from 19% a year ago), followed by Chief Technology or Chief Digital Officer (30%) as making the most crucial decisions in their organization.

CEOs are ready to adopt generative AI, but other executives have reservations

Three out of four (75%) CEOs surveyed believe the organization with the most advanced generative AI will have a competitive advantage.

Half (50%) of CEOs report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services; 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions, with 36% using the technology for operational decisions.

While 69% of CEO respondents see broad benefits of generative AI across their organization, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI.

Only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

Generative AI is fueling workforce changes

About 43% of surveyed CEOs say they have reduced or redeployed their workforce due to generative AI, with an additional 28% indicating they plan to do so in the next 12 months.

At the same time, 46% of CEOs surveyed have hired additional workers because of generative AI, with 26% saying they have plans for more hiring ahead.

Yet fewer than one in three CEOs (28%) surveyed have assessed the potential impact of generative AI on their workforces, and 36% say they plan to do so in the next 12 months.

Methodology: The IBM Institute for Business Value, in cooperation with Oxford Economics, interviewed 3,000 CEOs from over 30 countries and 24 industries as part of the 28th edition of the IBM C-Suite Study series. The IBM Institute for Business Value also conducted a survey of 200 CEOs in the United States on their responses to generative AI.

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CEOs Embrace Generative AI

Learn more about IBM

Nearly half of CEOs surveyed identify productivity as their highest business priority — up from sixth place in 2022, according to CEO decision-making in the age of AI, Act with intention, a study conducted by the IBM Institute for Business Value.

They recognize technology modernization is key to achieving their productivity goals, ranking it as second highest priority. Yet, CEOs can face key barriers as they race to modernize and adopt new technologies like generative AI.

The study found that three-quarters of CEO respondents believe that competitive advantage will depend on who has the most advanced generative AI. However, executives are also weighing potential risks or barriers of the technology such as bias, ethics and security. More than half (57%) of CEOs surveyed are concerned about data security and 48% worry about bias or data accuracy.

There is also a disconnect between CEOs and their teams when it comes to AI readiness. Half (50%) of CEOs surveyed report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services, and 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions. Yet, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI; only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

"Generative AI can reduce the barriers to AI adoption and half of CEOs interviewed are actively exploring it to drive a new wave of productivity, efficiency and quality of service across industries," said Jesus Mantas, Global Managing Partner, IBM Consulting. "CEOs need to assess their company requirements around data privacy, intellectual property protection, security, algorithmic accountability and governance in order to plan their deployment of emerging use cases of generative AI at scale."

Additional findings include:

CEOs say productivity — and the driving technology — is a pressing priority

Almost half (48%) of CEOs surveyed pinpoint productivity as a top priority for their organization.

Technology modernization follows as their second highest priority (45%) but CEOs also indicate this is among their top challenges.

For the fourth consecutive year, CEOs surveyed say technology factors remain the top external force impacting their organization over the next three years.

CEOs increasingly look toward operational, technology and data leaders as strategic decision makers

When asked which C-Suite members will make the most crucial decisions over the next three years, CEO respondents identify COOs (62%) and CFOs (52%).

The influence of technology leaders on decision making is growing — 38% of surveyed CEOs point to CIOs (up from 19% a year ago), followed by Chief Technology or Chief Digital Officer (30%) as making the most crucial decisions in their organization.

CEOs are ready to adopt generative AI, but other executives have reservations

Three out of four (75%) CEOs surveyed believe the organization with the most advanced generative AI will have a competitive advantage.

Half (50%) of CEOs report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services; 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions, with 36% using the technology for operational decisions.

While 69% of CEO respondents see broad benefits of generative AI across their organization, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI.

Only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

Generative AI is fueling workforce changes

About 43% of surveyed CEOs say they have reduced or redeployed their workforce due to generative AI, with an additional 28% indicating they plan to do so in the next 12 months.

At the same time, 46% of CEOs surveyed have hired additional workers because of generative AI, with 26% saying they have plans for more hiring ahead.

Yet fewer than one in three CEOs (28%) surveyed have assessed the potential impact of generative AI on their workforces, and 36% say they plan to do so in the next 12 months.

Methodology: The IBM Institute for Business Value, in cooperation with Oxford Economics, interviewed 3,000 CEOs from over 30 countries and 24 industries as part of the 28th edition of the IBM C-Suite Study series. The IBM Institute for Business Value also conducted a survey of 200 CEOs in the United States on their responses to generative AI.

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Enterprises today operate in a real-time environment where uninterrupted access to trusted data has become a baseline expectation for users, applications and automated systems. Traditional DataOps models, built on manual effort and human triage, cannot keep pace with this always active demand. AI agents are emerging as the operational backbone, ensuring consistent data availability, reinforcing trustworthiness and enabling a level of scale that manual processes cannot achieve ...

AI Deepfakes: Rethinking Trust in the Workplace

For decades, trust in the digital workplace rested on familiar signals. We trusted faces on video calls, voices on the phone, and emails that appeared to come from people we knew. These cues felt human and intuitive. They anchored how decisions were made, approvals were granted, and access was authorized. AI-powered deepfakes have quietly broken that model ...

Nine in Ten Enterprises Plan Cloud Data Repatriation amid Rising Cloud Costs and Data Sovereignty Mandates

Cloud migration was supposed to be a one-way door. For most enterprises, it turns out it isn't. Cloud data repatriation is a real and growing trend. A new survey ... finds that 89% of organizations plan to expand their on-premises infrastructure footprint over the next two years — and 75% have already moved at least some workloads back from public cloud in the past 24 months. The findings point to a broad rethinking of where data belongs ...

Why ITOps Need Right-Sized AI, Not Bigger Models

Over the past few years, large language models (LLMs) have revolutionized the software industry. Given their ability to excel at multi-step reasoning, LLMs have helped enterprises streamline workflows and adapt to the unknown. However, employing such models comes with sky-high costs, latency issues, and limited flexibility. In the realm of IT operations, it is generally wiser to employ smaller, domain-specific models instead ...

The End of Reactive DevOps: AI-Driven Observability for Zero-Defect Digital Systems

For years, DevOps teams operated under a simple assumption: collect enough telemetry, and you can find and fix any problem. That assumption is breaking down. Modern enterprises now operate across microservices, hybrid cloud environments, APIs, Kubernetes, and highly automated delivery pipelines. Releases happen continuously, dependencies shift constantly, and failures spread faster than teams can diagnose them ...

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Let me start with something I've seen play out more times than I can count. A team hits a wall with the cloud. Costs creep up, then spike. Performance starts to feel inconsistent. Someone in finance asks a simple question like "why did this double?" and nobody has a clean answer ... Maybe this isn't the right place for everything. That realization feels like a breakthrough, like you've identified the problem. In reality, you've just identified the starting line ...

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