AI is here, but most leaders say their workforces aren’t ready for it—highlighting a growing chasm that increasingly falls on the desk of HR. That’s according to a new study of 1,100 senior business and tech leaders across eight countries by IT infrastructure services provider Kyndryl.
The research finds that only 23% of those surveyed say their workforce is fully ready for AI, a notable six-percentage-point decrease over the last year.
Meanwhile, almost 80% of those surveyed anticipate the speed of AI advances will outpace their workforce, governance and operating models, while only one-third say AI is fully integrated across their organization.
Mark Paulek, CHRO of Kyndryl, tells HR Executive that the survey’s findings on lagging workforce readiness likely reflect the reality that leaders are seeing increased expectations for AI investment, while becoming more aware of how critical it is to bring people along on the AI journey.
“As companies look more deeply into their people readiness for AI,” he says, “they’re seeing the scale of the challenge increase. They have to have high engagement, high trust with the workforce to engage in reskilling and redeploying.”
The report suggests three primary strategies to enhance workforce readiness: redesigning roles, addressing skills gaps and building trust through governance. Those that have made significant progress toward these aims are identified as Pacesetters, a title given to only 9% of those surveyed.
Paulek says these are the organizations being “very intentional” about building trust, leaning into change management and redesigning processes around talent capabilities. Rather than simply throwing agentic AI onto all of their processes, they are identifying where efficiencies will actually matter the most.
“What we find is that the groups getting the most return on AI investment are doing the best blend of bringing people along by redesigning processes in conjunction with helping them with change management and trust,” he says.
See also: Top economists, Nobel laureates issue urgent AI warning for employers
The emergence of a new role
Kyndryl leverages an AI framework for customers—and considers itself customer zero—with an eye toward anticipating future workforce needs. That led the firm to create the human systems architect (HSA) role.
“Organizations are stacking intelligence onto operational structures that were never designed to carry it, then wondering why things buckle,” the firm wrote in an article on the HSA position. “You have to assess load capacity before you deploy—how work flows, where decisions are made, what the workforce can absorb and at what pace. That’s a human systems architecture problem.”
Paulek likens the HSA role, which is now offered as part of its integrated AI solutioning teams, to the conductor of an orchestra: If employees and AI agents are the musicians, the HSA is the conductor ensuring they all work together.
Such roles, which he notes will continue to evolve as AI integration does, can help organizations prepare their workforce for the change to support sustainable AI strategizing.
“They need training, they need to know how to pivot and embrace the experience,” he says.
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