It’s no secret that companies in every economic sector are undergoing significant transformations as artificial intelligence (AI) is introduced into the working environment. Many business consultants insist that entirely new business models are required to succeed in the AI Era. Even though artificial intelligence captures most of the headlines, journalist Mark Chillingworth reports that a survey conducted last year found that the greatest challenge facing companies is not AI adoption. He explains, “Artificial Intelligence is a change management issue for organizations, not a technology challenge. ... There are technological obstacles to the adoption of AI in the enterprise, but the most significant barriers involve perceptions, understanding, and collaboration.”[1] Journalist Grant Gross agrees. He writes, “Most company executives believe their AI rollouts have been successful, but they apparently haven’t asked their employees.”[2] He adds, “Less than half of workers see their organizations’ approach to gen AI as strategic and successful. … The huge disconnect between executive and employee attitudes about gen AI have serious implications, with employee trust in AI and long-term adoption in doubt.”

Change Management is Hard

As I have often pointed out in the past, change management is hard and it always has been. Centuries ago Niccolò Machiavelli, in his classic The Prince, wrote, “There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things, because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.” As Machiavelli so eloquently highlighted, getting people to welcome, support, and embrace change is the biggest obstacle leaders face.

Echoing Machiavelli’s thoughts in the AI Era, David Timis, a Senior Fellow at the Global Governance Institute, and Shaista Khilji, a Professor at George Washington University, write, “While executives push for rapid AI scaling, most employees feel threatened by it. This tension has created a ‘capability overhang’; a significant gap between what AI systems can technically do and how they are actually used in practice.”[3] They believe there are five types of individuals with whom leadership must deal in order to foster successful change management. Those types are:

• AI enthusiasts: AI enthusiasts “are eager to champion new tools. An organization channels this energy by appointing enthusiasts as ‘AI champions’ or internal super-users.”

• AI curious: AI curious individuals are “intrigued by the technology's potential but fundamentally pragmatic, they withhold full buy-in until their technical and operational questions are answered.”

• AI cautious: AI cautious workers are “acutely aware of data security, ethical guardrails, and the unintended consequences AI might have on human collaboration.”

• AI skeptics: AI skeptics are “intellectual pragmatists who doubt corporate hype and demand empirical proof of utility before altering their workflows.”

• AI opposed: Employees who outright oppose adopting AI solutions are “driven by deep psychological or socio-economic fears, such as immediate job displacement or corporate surveillance. These individuals represent the deepest layer of resistance. Because these individuals strongly resist or completely refuse to use AI tools, an organization must address their underlying anxieties directly.”

Timis and Khilji go on to observe, “Our study highlights that resistance to AI is deeply rooted and operates in two arenas. In frontstage settings — public, visible areas — employees may appear to comply with AI mandates to manage impressions. However, in backstage settings, they often engage in informal critique, ‘clowning’ AI tools, or finding ways to circumvent and delay their use. Even ‘AI enthusiasts’ tasked with implementing strategies related to this emerging technology often privately doubt their effectiveness.”

What Change Managers Must Do

Timis and Khilji assert, “If business leaders implement AI initiatives without considering employee input, they will continue to see lackluster results and wasted investment.” Analysts from the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) agree. They insist, “Successful transformation will hinge not on the technology but on the people transformation that goes alongside it.”[4] One reason that “people transformation” is difficult, they explain, is that “many companies excel at tracking and responding to shifts in customer behavior” but “many business leaders struggle to grasp how their own employees feel.” In order to transform the workforce successfully, Timis and Khilji and BCG analysts offer a few suggestions. They are:

• Create an organizational culture of cognitive empathy. Understanding how employees feel about AI transformation is the baseline starting point. BCG analysts suggest it is important “to understand more perspectives from different functions and stratas in the organization to incorporate in decision-making and conviction.” Timis and Khilji add, “Because successful AI deployment fundamentally necessitates behavioral adaptation, leaders must focus on fostering workplace trust through radical organizational transparency.” Trust is important. Gross notes, “A lack of trust leads to more sinister implications. Nearly a third of employees surveyed admitted to ‘sabotaging’ their companies’ AI strategies.”

• Focus on "pro-worker" AI and human-machine symbiosis. Timis and Khilji write, “Instead of evaluating new software through the purely technical lens of ‘How can we use AI?’, forward-thinking executives must ask a fundamentally problem-oriented question: ‘What systemic problem are we trying to solve?’ Shifting the strategic focus toward human-machine symbiosis, where technology explicitly augments and empowers human labor rather than simply substituting it, significantly lowers employee apprehension while boosting project ROI.” BCG analysts suggest that change managers should make “regular pulse checks on employee engagement.” They insist, “People need to feel understood, supported, and valued.”

• Address the roots of employee unease. Timis and Khilji explain, “Until organizations actively acknowledge the multifaceted nature of worker concerns — which stretch beyond technical hurdles to include energy costs, human connection, and the erosion of core cognitive skills — AI adoption will remain an uphill battle.”

Erik Roth, Global Head of Applied Innovation at BlackRock, observes, “Simply putting new technology into people’s hands does not ensure they will use it effectively, nor does it profoundly change the way a company works. Instead, CEOs need to deploy a novel change management approach that mobilizes their people, turning them from gen AI experimenters into gen AI accelerators. This is not a linear process. Change management in the gen AI age asks employees to become active participants rather than just users. It asks employees to experiment, cocreate products, and commit to continual skill development. It also recognizes that not everyone will make the transition smoothly, and that some employees will need additional support.”[5]

Concluding Thoughts

Even when you empathize with and empower employees, successful transformation is difficult to achieve. Change is happening so fast that McKinsey & Company analysts conclude, “People are exhausted. From senior leaders to frontline workers, employees are feeling tired and even burned out from too much change. Many are uncertain about what the future will bring. When change becomes ‘everything, everywhere, all at once,’ it’s not surprising that employees feel worn out.”[6] The bad news, according to the McKinsey analysts, “The pace of change is not going to slow down; in fact, it is likely to accelerate.” As a result, change management is going to become even more important in the months and years to come. Companies that deal effectively with change will be the winners in the everchanging business landscape. The McKinsey analysts note, “The world that is emerging is ripe with opportunities for high growth and dynamism.” In this new business world, they insist leaders “need to learn how to manage a new and more unsettling form of change: reinvention. Reinvention goes beyond adapting processes or structures, challenging the very identity of the company. It requires rethinking how organizations create value and who they are at their core.” Corporate reinvention begins by helping employees reinvent themselves along the way.

Footnotes

[1] Mark Chillingworth, “The diginomica network research reveals change management, not tech, is biggest AI challenge. Can enterprises keep up?” diginomica, 17 November 2025.

[2] Grant Gross, “Executives love their AI rollouts, but employees aren’t buying it,” CIO, 8 August 2025.

[3] David Timis and Shaista Khilji, “The 5 faces of human readiness for AI adoption – and how to work with them,” World Economic Forum, 1 June 2026.

[4] Staff, “Change is Hard. Empathy Is Essential in AI Transformations.” Boston Consulting Group, 4 November 2025.

[5] Erik Roth, “Reconfiguring work: Change management in the age of gen AI,” QuantumBlack, 13 August 2025.

[6] Aaron De Smet, Arne Gast, Erik Mandersloot, Richard Steele, and Carmen James, “Change is changing: How to meet the challenge of radical reinvention,” McKinsey & Company, 19 November 2025.