The AI disconnect: How leaders can translate optimism into measurable impact

Snapshot: The biggest gains from adopting AI aren’t about saving time — they’re about expanding potential. A new global survey of executives, decision makers, and knowledge workers reveals that organizations truly transforming with AI see more than double the innovation, competitive advantage, creativity, and ability to accelerate the business and free up employees to focus on meaningful work. Read the full research report, Beyond AI Optimism: Five ways to move your business from saving time to sparking innovation, or read on for key findings.

The state of AI transformation today

A few years into the AI revolution, it’s natural to wonder whether your business is truly transforming with AI, getting left behind, or making steady progress. To get a snapshot of the state of AI transformation, we partnered with Hypothesis Group on a global research study spanning six markets (US, UK, India, Japan, Brazil, and France) and more than 2,500 leaders and knowledge workers from organizations. We looked at organizations with 300+ employees that have already started their AI journey.

The results reveal that only a small fraction of companies (about 3%) have truly transformed with AI. But the good news is that the best practices embraced by these AI leaders can be adopted by organizations at every stage of AI transformation.

Three other emerging themes:

• Executive optimism outpaces reality on the ground. Although employees are all-in on AI, they’re often held back by a lack of a top-down strategy, robust training, and a clear AI roadmap.
  
  
• Time savings are the fuel, not the finish line. Almost every company that has deployed AI is seeing measurable value in time savings and productivity, but the bigger, more strategic prize is innovation. Driving real impact with AI isn’t merely about writing emails or documents faster; it’s about inventing and shipping better products and services faster.
  
  
• Real change is possible. With the right tools and approaches to AI, organizations in every industry can transform how they work, helping employees boost creativity, focus on work that matters, and accelerate the pipeline from idea to market.
  
  

Key findings

The AI disconnect

While surveyed employees are using AI daily (61%) and wish their organizations would focus on it more (84%), only 1-in-3 feel prepared to adapt to changes driven by AI. Meanwhile, executives are 15% more likely to say AI has had a significant positive impact — highlighting a disconnect between executive perception and employee reality.

The AI spectrum

Transformation doesn’t follow a single path; it evolves along a spectrum. And while every organization’s journey is distinct, clear patterns emerge in the breadth and depth of use, separating transformed organizations from those still getting started.

We identified five levels of transformation, through both the number of AI use cases and the number of departments using AI across the organization. Each level reflects clear differences in how organizations perceive, strategize, and realize outcomes with AI. We found, only 3% of orgs are highly transformed with AI, while 72% are in the early stages.

Unlocking AI’s bigger potential

AI continues to help employees do more in less time. Organizations report that AI reduces time spent searching for information (40%), decreases time spent on mundane tasks (39%), and helps complete tasks faster (38%). But time savings and productivity gains are just the first step in transformation. Highly transformed organizations are achieving much deeper impact with AI:

Ready to bridge the AI gap?

Take the pulse on your AI maturity with these questions adapted from our global survey.

• How many teams and departments have deployed AI?
• How many different kinds of use cases have been developed? Are the use cases well defined and broadly shared?
• Is there a clear but evolving road map and strategy?
• Is there widespread advocacy for AI, including from the C suite?
• Are there communications, training, and incentives that help make AI part of everyday work?
• Is there a significant budget dedicated to AI adoption?

It’s no accident that highly transformed organizations answer “many” and “yes” to these questions. Now let’s dive into some practical ways your organization can accelerate your own transformation.

5 steps to AI transformation

Regardless of your AI maturity, adopting best practices from highly transformed organizations can accelerate your own transformation.

1. Create a transparent “always on” strategy & roadmap. Clarify how AI fits into the organization’s broader goals and how it will evolve as the technology advances.
   Proofpoint: Highly transformed orgs are 39% more likely to continuously refine AI frameworks to optimize workflows over time.
   
   
2. Foster an authentic approach to AI. Be intentional about embedding AI in your culture and empowering employees to use AI confidently.
   Proofpoint: Highly transformed orgs are 36% more likely to align AI adoption with needs of teams and end users.
   
   
3. Identify & prioritize quick wins. Focus on well-defined use cases that demonstrate value across teams and roles.
   Proof point: Highly transformed orgs are 48% more likely to adopt AI widely across multiple roles and departments.
   
   
4. Democratize advocacy. Emphasize that transformation scales when advocacy extends beyond the AI team.
   Proof point: Highly transformed orgs are 52% more likely to have company-wide AI advocates.
   
   
5. Embrace new ways of working & new tools. Recognize that transformation requires investment not only in technology but also in communications, training, and incentives that help make AI part of everyday work. Finding the right tools and integrating them into your workstream is critical to this.
   Proof point: Highly transformed orgs are 18% more likely to say it’s important to have AI fully integrated within existing tools/apps.

How Workspace with Gemini can fuel your AI transformation

Google Workspace with Gemini helps organizations transform by using secure-by-design AI tools that are intuitive and easy to learn. And with the introduction of Gemini Enterprise, Google now offers an end-to-end set of agentic capabilities, so customers can have a comprehensive solution that’s built for AI transformation.

Read our full research report: Beyond AI Optimism: Five ways to move your business from saving time to sparking innovation.