Many leaders are beginning to do the serious work of making generative AI’s vast potential a reality.

Deloitte’s quarterly State of GenAI in the Enterprise survey, which connected with nearly 2,000 director to c-suite level respondents to explore the current landscape of GenAI adoption, shows that organizations who report “high” or “very high” GenAI expertise are quickly moving past the infatuation stage, and starting to implement the technology across their workforces. 

As organizations move forward on their GenAI journeys, I believe they’ll likely need to focus on driving tangible benefits and value creation in order to scale up GenAI deployments beyond pilots and proofs of concept. This, in turn, will require organizations to address two critical challenges: building trust among workers and helping team members evolve their skills. 

When we examine the strategies employed by GenAI-savvy leaders, we uncover valuable insights that can guide other leaders in defining their own objectives and identifying relevant use cases for GenAI. 

How leaders are proving the value of GenAI

Many organizations are increasingly emphasizing the need for their GenAI initiatives and investments to have clear value objectives and deliver tangible results. But there are many ways to define and measure value. Although financial return on investment (ROI) is important, value drivers such as innovation, strategic positioning, and competitive differentiation can be even more important. 

While it can sometimes make sense to emphasize immediate payback, experimentation, learning, and innovation are incredibly valuable to any team. As a result, many forward-thinking organizations are implementing GenAI without specific ROI targets as they believe they can’t afford to get left behind in this critical and fast-moving market.

While many organizations are still focused on tactical benefits, like increased efficiency and productivity, GenAI experts say the advantage of the technology is greatest in strategic and growth-related areas such as improving products and services and encouraging innovation and growth. For example, 70% of organizations with high or very high GenAI expertise report that they have improved existing products and services and 63% say they have encouraged innovation and growth. Leaders like these are likely having more success at capturing benefits because they are scaling up much more aggressively, which provides a larger base for generating benefits.

How leaders are scaling up

Scaling up GenAI is when the potential benefits can be converted into real-world value, but it is also when potential challenges become real-world barriers. For instance, scaling up any initiative requires effort across a variety of teams across strategy, operations, HR, and IT. And in the era of GenAI, challenges such as risk management and governance, workforce transformation, trust and data management take on even greater importance. 

Broad adoption of these new technologies and tools is key but can be hindered by unrealistic expectations—both in terms of overestimating what the technology can do, and being fearful of it. Nearly half of survey respondents (46%) are providing approved GenAI access to just a small portion of their workforce (20% or less). In comparison, GenAI experts are further along, with nearly half (48%) providing approved GenAI access to at least 40% of their workforce. 

Some leaders are adopting “horizontal scaling” in addition to vertical or use case-based scaling. This involves putting GenAI into the hands of as many people as possible. I believe widespread but controlled access to GenAI can ultimately drive innovation across the business as employees find new ways to use the technology every day. I also believe doing so can help create realistic expectations from the workforce and supports adoption. 

How leaders are building trust

Lack of trust continues to be one of the biggest barriers to large-scale GenAI adoption and deployment. While 72% of all respondents agree that their organization’s trust in GenAI has increased over the last two years, addressing trust is likely to become critically important as organizations transition from experimentation to large-scale deployment. 

Despite how important it is for leaders to establish trust, fewer than half of the survey’s overall respondents (40 to 45%) say they are, to a “large” or “very large” extent, implementing processes to improve trust in their GenAI initiatives through various aspects (such as data quality, output reliability, and organizational empathy). However, among organizations that report “very high” GenAI expertise, the focus on trust is much higher across every aspect (59-73%). This likely reflects both their greater appreciation for the importance of trust, and their greater reliance on GenAI as an integral and crucial part of the business.

How leaders are evolving the workforce

Three-quarters of survey respondents (75%) expect to change their talent strategies within two years in response to advancements in GenAI. Organizations with “very high” GenAI expertise expect to change their talent strategies even faster, with 32% already making changes. In today’s extremely competitive market for AI talent, organizations are not only aggressively pursuing new talent, but also training their broader workforce on GenAI. 

Research suggests that when GenAI is deployed at scale, different technical and human-focused skills will become more important. To succeed, organizations will likely need to move beyond simple GenAI fluency and create new roles, new work processes, and adapt to a new organizational culture—with an active focus on developing junior talent into senior talent that can use GenAI to its full advantage. 

Moving ahead or falling behind

Organizations with leaders who possess high or very high GenAI expertise are moving past the infatuation stage and implementing efforts to create value at scale. These organizations are leading the way in proving the value of GenAI, with a focus on strategic and growth-related areas such as improving products and services and encouraging innovation and growth. Other organizations are moving more slowly—and I believe they risk falling behind or missing opportunities.

Scaling requires effort across a variety of interrelated elements spanning strategy, process, people, data, and technology. Building trust and evolving the workforce are critical challenges that organizations need to address to successfully deploy GenAI at scale. Ultimately, we have found that organizations with very high GenAI expertise are more focused on building trust and changing their talent strategies to succeed in the competitive market for GenAI talent.

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Costi Perricos leads Deloitte’s global office of generative AI.