productivity

EY Global Vice Chair: AI’s Biggest Paradox Comes Down to What AI Can’t Do

EY Global Vice Chair Julie Teigland emphasizes that while AI excels at repetitive tasks and data processing, it cannot replace essential human judgment required to set goals, interpret context, and make decisions. She highlights that companies miss out on significant AI productivity gains due to gaps in talent development, particularly in cultivating AI fluency as a leadership skill that integrates technical operation with critical evaluation. Teigland advocates for collaborative approaches across organizations and ecosystems to efficiently scale AI technology without reinventing solutions, citing EY’s work with partners that improved operational performance and speed.

https://fortune.com/2026/09/27/ai-fluency-human-judgment-leadership/

Why the Most Obvious AI Use Case Is Often the Wrong One

Midsize law firms should focus AI adoption on work where efficiency gains are measurable and verification burdens are manageable, rather than simply targeting the highest-volume tasks. Key factors influencing ROI include the ease of verifying AI outputs and the firm’s pricing model, with fixed-fee work providing the clearest demonstration of commercial value. Firms already using AI informally must formalize their approach by selecting AI-suitable tasks that balance verification complexity and billing structure to build a strong internal business case and guide strategic investment.

https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en/institute/spotlight/midsize-firms-obvious-ai-use-cases

Employees Use AI, but Many Say They Don’t Know Why

A Culture Amp study found that while 85% of employees are encouraged to use AI at work and 71% feel more productive with it, only 58% understand why their companies are implementing AI, and just 60% have received examples from managers on how AI supports their work. The report also noted similar workload levels between AI users and nonusers, suggesting a gap between perceived productivity gains and actual output, and emphasized the need for leadership to provide clearer communication and strategic frameworks around AI adoption to realize true organizational ROI.

https://www.hrdive.com/news/employees-use-ai-but-many-say-they-dont-know-why/831073/

7 Ways to Restructure IT for Maximum Productivity

CIOs can boost IT productivity by restructuring around business value, consolidating key teams like security and engineering, and creating cross-functional groups with end-to-end ownership of business capabilities. Emphasizing workflow optimization, domain expertise with mentoring, disciplined tool management, and collaborative problem-solving reduces friction, breaks down silos, and aligns IT efforts with strategic outcomes. Integrating AI thoughtfully into platforms and operations further enhances agility and impact across technology functions.

https://www.cio.com/article/4224624/7-ways-to-restructure-it-for-maximum-productivity.html

The Productivity Illusion at the Heart of Enterprise AI Coding

AI coding tools speed up code creation but often cause hidden downstream costs due to lack of enterprise context like architecture, business rules, and compliance. Organizations that integrate AI throughout the software development lifecycle—embedding governance, ensuring reliable enterprise context, and coordinating workflows—achieve significant productivity, quality, and time-to-market improvements by reducing rework and defects. The strategic advantage lies in building infrastructure to provide AI with relevant context, enabling truly production-ready AI-assisted development.

https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/the-productivity-illusion-at-the-heart-of-enterprise-ai-coding/

Don’t Automate Bad Workflows: Why AI Should Begin with Redesign

Organizations should prioritize redesigning workflows before applying AI automation, as many existing processes have become inefficient over time due to accumulated approvals, redundancies, and outdated steps. Effective AI deployment begins with simplifying, standardizing, and rethinking workflows to align with desired business outcomes, enabling automation to enhance value rather than merely accelerating outdated practices. This approach helps improve operational efficiency, employee experience, and measurable business results while avoiding the risk of embedding past inefficiencies into future technology.

https://www.cio.com/article/4207454/dont-automate-bad-workflows-why-ai-should-begin-with-redesign.html

How Will AI Automation Hit — Like a Crashing Wave or a Rising Tide?

New research from MIT FutureTech shows that AI automation is progressing gradually across many text-based workplace tasks rather than arriving as sudden disruptive waves. Evaluations of over 6,000 tasks found AI can already perform 50–75% of them sufficiently without edits, with steady improvement allowing time for workers and organizations to adapt. The study suggests that AI-enabled task automation will vary across occupations, offering a window for strategic planning rather than immediate widespread disruption.

https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/how-will-ai-automation-hit-a-crashing-wave-or-a-rising-tide

The Production Assumptions AI Just Broke

AI agents disrupt traditional production assumptions by acting autonomously, generating unpredictable workloads and traffic patterns that challenge existing operational models. CIOs must adapt production environments with enhanced observability, incident response playbooks, capacity planning, and change management tailored to AI’s distinct behaviors before scaling AI-driven workflows enterprise-wide. Preparing production for AI’s operational impact is critical to avoid instability, ensure traceability, and support sustainable AI adoption beyond pilot stages.

https://www.cio.com/article/4205139/the-production-assumptions-ai-just-broke.html

Agentic AI Boosts Productivity, but C-suite Struggles to Reap Value

The article discusses how agentic AI technologies enhance productivity by automating complex tasks, yet many C-suite executives struggle to capture their full value due to challenges in integration, strategy alignment, and change management. It highlights the need for leadership to develop clear frameworks and governance around AI deployment to effectively leverage these tools for business outcomes.

https://www.ciodive.com/news/agentic-productivity-c-suite-value/826999/

Leaders: Your Calendar Is Your Culture and Your Strategy. Set It Carefully

The article argues that a leader’s calendar reveals their true priorities and shapes organizational culture more effectively than formal mission statements or value lists. Effective leaders manage their attention and time deliberately to balance urgent tasks with strategic planning, demonstrating what truly matters to their teams and building trust. This focus on “attention management” is presented as essential for leadership success in an era of increasing responsibilities and automated work.

https://www.fastcompany.com/91573455/your-calendar-is-your-culture-and-leadership-strategy-leadership-management-advice-calendar

Scroll to Top