Executives’ higher AI use does not establish rollout readiness

Executive AI use and rollout readiness measure different things

Executives can use AI more often than their employees and still need a clearer understanding of how to lead its adoption. Using the technology gives leaders direct experience with tools they may ask others to use. But readiness also depends on what employees understand, how openly leaders address their own knowledge gaps, and where people prefer human assistance.

Each question calls for different evidence. Proper Insights and Analytics found substantial differences in workplace AI use by seniority, while a separate Emergn study examined senior leaders’ knowledge gaps and learning needs. Preferences for human help in banking and healthcare add another consideration: experience with AI at work can coexist with a strong preference for people in particular services.

Executives lead employees in AI adoption

The workplace findings show a substantial executive lead in adoption. Proper Insights and Analytics surveyed 7,675 U.S. adults in June, including 1,960 executives and business owners and 1,471 employees. Among executives, 53.2% reported using generative AI, which produces content in response to a request, compared with 37.9% of employees. Executives had more direct experience overall, although usage varied considerably within both groups.

To explore those differences, Channel V Media analyzed the survey and issued a report. The public relations firm helps companies influence how AI engines describe them, so it benefits commercially from demand for advice on communicating about AI. Its analysis separated use from awareness, understanding, willingness to use an AI agent, a system that performs tasks on a user’s behalf, at work, and approval of agentic AI, meaning AI systems that carry out tasks.

These measures need to be read separately because each captures a different relationship with the technology. Higher usage indicates more reported experience, while a lower percentage who have heard of generative AI without understanding it indicates fewer respondents reporting that knowledge gap. The figures below come from Channel V Media’s analysis of the Proper Insights and Analytics survey; the survey chart was credited to CFO.com and created with Datawrapper.

The usage gap is especially large for agentic AI: Channel V Media described executives as 2.7 times more likely to use it. Yet awareness extends much further than current use in both groups. Approval also exceeds stated willingness to use an agent at work, which means a favorable opinion alone gives an incomplete guide to likely workplace participation.

The understanding measure gives employers another reason to check employees’ starting point. In the Proper survey, nearly three in ten employees had heard of generative AI without understanding it, so leaders familiar with the technology could set expectations beyond employees’ knowledge. Planning around executive familiarity carries that risk. Establishing what employees understand gives leaders a firmer basis for choosing the explanation and learning support they need.

Differences in understanding sit alongside differences in use. Research was the leading generative-AI use among executives and business owners, while internet searches led among employees. Channel V Media interpreted the broader results this way: “Leaders appear to be moving past AI as a search tool toward AI-assisted creation and knowledge work. Much of the workforce hasn’t followed,” it wrote. The firm sees a progression in use, while the search activity itself describes employees’ leading application.

Group-level findings help frame an adoption discussion, but understanding a particular leader’s knowledge requires looking at that individual. An executive average combines people with different experience and learning needs. Emergn’s separate survey of senior leaders examines why some of those needs can be hard to identify: some leaders conceal what they do not understand.

Some senior leaders conceal AI knowledge gaps

To examine leaders’ experience of AI-driven change, Emergn surveyed 350 U.S. senior leaders and found that nearly one in five, or 18%, admitted overstating their understanding of AI. Emergn is a technology and management consulting firm, so it benefits when companies seek outside help with technology adoption and organizational change. The finding has direct implications for decision-making: some leaders present themselves as knowing more than they do.

Emergn CEO Alex Adamopoulos linked that behavior to the expectation that leaders should have answers. “It is hard to admit you do not understand something when you are supposed to be the person with the answers,” he said in a release. Concealing the gap leaves the learning need unresolved, as he explained: “But pretending leaves you with the same unanswered question tomorrow.” So leaders need room to acknowledge uncertainty and address the questions behind it when making decisions.

The pressure to close those gaps also shapes how leaders view their careers. More than a quarter of Emergn’s respondents, 27%, expected their career prospects to suffer unless they substantially improved their AI skills within the next year. For them, learning had a deadline and a personal consequence: improving their skills was part of maintaining their professional position.

Alongside that career concern, respondents reported strain from the pace and effects of AI-driven change. Among Emergn’s respondents, nineteen percent reported anxiety or disrupted sleep, while 20% felt out of their depth because of AI’s impact on their role. The difficulties differ, ranging from emotional pressure to uncertainty about carrying out leadership responsibilities, so each calls for employers to consider a different learning or support need.

Access to learning also influences how some leaders view their employer. Twenty-seven percent of Emergn’s respondents said they would change employers for better AI training, making development relevant to retention as well as work performance. They expressed a willingness to move; the response does not record actual departures. Even so, it gives employers a reason to treat access to AI training as part of the employment relationship.

These findings add an individual learning question to the adoption differences in the Proper survey. Proper surveyed executives and business owners within a wider adult sample, while Emergn examined a separate group of U.S. senior leaders, so the studies describe distinct populations and measures. Leaders can use the first to understand differences in reported adoption and the second to consider how expectations and career pressure may shape discussions about learning.

Executives still prefer people in high-stakes services

Beyond workplace use and learning, adoption decisions depend on the task people want help with. The Proper survey found that three-quarters of executives, 76.8%, preferred assistance from a live person in banking and financial services. For healthcare matters, the figure was 77.4%, according to Channel V Media’s report. Executives’ greater use of AI at work thus coexists with strong preferences for human assistance in these services.

Employee preferences in those services were described as virtually identical to executives’ preferences, so the large seniority gap in workplace AI use largely disappears on this question. Using AI for work and choosing how to receive financial or healthcare assistance are different decisions. Experience with the technology therefore gives only a partial guide to the service someone wants. The task changes the preference.

Those preferences led Channel V Media to advise executives to consider their own reservations when promoting products to the public. “The same hesitation applies to their customers … and the messaging has to assume it’s there,” the report said. This customer interpretation is the firm’s advice, informed by the reported service preferences of executives and employees. Its commercial interest in communications work matters when weighing that recommendation.

For product and marketing leaders applying that advice, the practical question is how customers want to receive help. Messaging centered on AI can miss that concern if it assumes the technology itself is the benefit customers value most. In banking and healthcare, communications need to explain what assistance customers can expect and how it addresses their preference for human help. Executives have a direct reason to take that preference seriously: they express it themselves.

Key highlights

• Check employee readiness before rollout: Generative AI use reaches 53.2% among executives versus 37.9% among employees, while 29.3% of employees report awareness without understanding. Rollout owners need to assess employee knowledge when setting expectations and choosing training.
• Make leadership learning gaps discussable: In a separate survey, 18% of senior leaders admitted overstating their AI understanding, and 27% would change employers for better AI training. Employers that give leaders room to acknowledge uncertainty and access relevant training address both decision-making and retention concerns.
• Plan for human assistance: About 77% of executives prefer live help in banking and healthcare, with employee preferences virtually identical. Product and marketing leaders need to explain how customers will receive assistance and account for those preferences when promoting AI-enabled services.