AI is making stakeholders excited and CEOs nervous.
A recent global study of 900 CEOs, conducted by Harris Poll and AI firm Dataiku, finds that 81% of those surveyed fear that failing AI deployments could cost them their jobs this year. Despite the high stakes of getting AI right, many still worry about what happens when it gets things wrong: 34% said they wouldn’t allow AI to make decisions without human approval.
The pressure on these executives is coming in from all sides:
- Around 62% of CEOs report that their boards are actively pressuring them to deliver measurable AI-driven outcomes.
- Meanwhile, 75% reported that they believe a fellow CEO will be ousted as a result of a bungled AI rollout.
- CEOs are largely concerned about competitors getting ahead: 56% admit their competitors have stronger AI strategies than they do.
The problem can be summed up by a phrase that’s been floating around since last year: Capability overhang. There is no question that these models are capable of incredible things, but actually deploying them is another ballgame altogether.
And despite the pressure, there are still major trust issues around the risks that this tech presents. 79% worry about the legal risks and ramifications of using the technology, and 57% worry about the inability to trace an AI output back to its source. Concerns about these risks are causing holdups: 51% reported delaying their rollouts due to regulatory issues.
“Every enterprise now has access to powerful AI,” Florian Douetteau, CEO and co-founder of Dataiku, said in a statement. “The differentiator is whether they can turn that power into reliable business decisions. That is the cognitive dissonance happening in the C-suite right now.”
Our Deeper View
As CEOs begin to crack under the pressure to deliver results, they face the same looming unease about the tech that everyone is grappling with. Models are growing more powerful by the day, promising to upend every industry. Keeping up with the shifting tide of AI is becoming untenable. With the narrative growing that AI will permanently alter the way we work, live and think, the question may be whether we should slow down and consider what we should allow this tech to alter. As one CEO expressed it at the HumanX event: "Slow down to speed up."