Dive Brief:
- More than half of C-suite leaders expect AI to save them money in 2024, according to a Boston Consulting Group survey of more than 1,400 executives across 14 industries published this week.
- Of those executives, around half expect cost savings in excess of 10%, BCG found. Executives anticipate the ROI to come primarily through increased productivity in operations, customer service and IT.
- Nearly three-quarters of executives are increasing tech investments this year, up from 60% in 2023. Nine in 10 organizations plan to up spending on AI and generative AI.
Dive Insight:
Generative AI dominated tech conversations in 2023. The talk has now translated into spending.
Nearly 9 in 10 C-suite leaders rank AI and generative AI among their top three tech priorities. But a gap remains between aspirations related to the technology and how enterprises have been able to execute.
Training initiatives have become a key point of enterprise generative AI plans even as some fall short of reaching their upskilling goals.
Only 6% of companies have trained more than one-quarter of employees on generative AI tools so far, BCG found. Leaders will need to brush up on AI skills as well, with more than half of organizations saying they have limited or no confidence in their executive team’s proficiency in generative AI.
The lack of skills threatens enterprise ambitions for transformative benefits to user experience, productivity and accessibility.
