Findings from the IBM Institute for Business Value revealed that banking and financial markets (BFM) CEOs are facing workforce and culture and challenges as they act quickly to implement and scale generative AI across their organizations.
The findings are part of an annual global cross-industry study that surveyed more than 3,000 CEOs from over 30 countries and 26 industries, which included 297 BFM CEOs representing retail, corporate, commercial and investment banks and financial markets.
The findings also revealed that CEOs are navigating complex issues around culture in the era of AI. 59% of surveyed BFM CEOs stated that cultural change within a business is more important than overcoming technical challenges when becoming a data-driven business, with 65% also believing success with AI will depend more on people’s adoption than the technology itself.
Despite this, 60% of surveyed BFM CEOs say they are pushing for AI adoption more quickly than some employees might find comfortable. Yet 43% acknowledged that their employees do not fully understand how strategic decisions impact them.
Skills also proved to be an area of focus for the CEOs. While 60% of surveyed BFM CEOs say their teams have the skills and knowledge to incorporate generative AI, more than half (53%) of respondents say they are already struggling to fill key technology roles. In addition, 50% of these CEOs said they are hiring for roles that did not even exist this time last year due to generative AI, showing the rapid shift occurring in the workforce.
Key study findings include:
The workforce is shifting rapidly.
- 50% of CEOs surveyed said they are hiring for roles that did not even exist last year due to the rise of generative AI.
- Yet, more than half (53%) of respondents say they are already struggling to fill key technology roles.
- 60% of respondents said their current team has the knowledge and skills to incorporate new technologies like AI.
- Only 40% of respondents have assessed the potential impact of generative AI on their workforce.
- Surveyed CEOs say 34% of their workforce will require retraining and reskilling over the next three years – up from just 7% in 2021.
Financial institution leaders recognize it takes a cultural shift to scale AI successfully but face collaboration and adoption challenges within their organizations.
- 64% of CEOs surveyed say their organization’s success is directly tied to the quality of collaboration between finance and technology, yet half (50%) say competition among their C-Suite executives sometimes impedes collaboration.
- 59% agree that cultural change is more important to becoming a data-driven business than overcoming technical challenges.
- 65% of BFM CEOs say that succeeding with AI will depend more on people’s adoption than the technology itself.
- At the same time, 43% acknowledge that their employees do not fully understand how strategic decisions impact them.
- 60% of surveyed CEOs say they push for AI adoption more quickly than some might find comfortable.
- 64% of surveyed BFM CEOs say to win the future, they must rewrite their organizational playbook.
- 72% plan to maintain or accelerate their organization’s pace of transformational change in 2024.
