ORLANDO, Fla. — The shift is already underway: AI is moving from the peak of inflated expectations to the infamous “trough of disillusionment,” according to analyst firm Gartner. But the shift represents a tremendous opportunity for CIOs to demonstrate the ROI of AI technologies.
“Gartner’s latest C-suite survey finds that you — CIOs — are the second-most-trusted C-suite member in high-growth companies, behind only the CFO. This is your hero moment,” said Alicia Mullery, a vice president at Gartner. Mullery spoke during a keynote here at Gartner’s IT Symposium/Xpo Monday.
Productivity gains remain the No. 1 use case for AI, said fellow keynoter Daryl Plummer, a distinguished vice president at Gartner. Among CFOs, 74% reported productivity gains from AI use, he noted. Only 11% of organizations, however, see a clear ROI for their AI implementations. “Take your AI use cases to the next level, because the road to value is not paved with productivity wins alone, and value is in the eye of the beholder,” said Plummer to an audience that included 7,000 CIOs and IT professionals. “In the private sector, value is growth. In the public sector, it’s mission success, and all of you want cost reductions.”
Balancing AI Readiness with Human Readiness
In order to achieve success in AI usage, organizations need to balance “AI readiness” with “human readiness,” Plummer explained. This means having a workforce that’s interested in using AI technologies that also trusts leadership teams to provide an AI roadmap. While “87% of employees are interested in using AI tools, only 32% are confident in leadership to drive AI transformation,” Plummer said.
On the road to balancing AI and human readiness, CIOs should put the management of AI accuracy and AI agents at the top of their list of priorities, he said.
Mullery added, “Gartner finds that 84% of CIOs and IT leaders don’t have a formal process to track AI accuracy. In fact, the top approach used today is human review, but the human-in-the-loop-equation is collapsing of itself,” since AI can make mistakes faster than humans can catch those errors and AI can produce hallucinations or distorted facts.
Meanwhile, less than 20% of CIOs say their organization is using AI agents, and the value of those agents varies, Plummer said. “Not all agents are created equal,” he said, calling out the nearly 90% of CIOs currently focused on conversational chatbots.
“Using [AI] agents to handle conversations is missing the point,” he said. Organizations need a more ambitious approach to AI agents that can monitor customers’ purchases, renew requests for proposals, and negotiate terms and conditions, for example. CIOs should focus on AI agents that provide reasoning and autonomous decision-making capabilities, in addition to conversational features, he said.
Weighing Cost and Vendor Selection Within an AI Strategy
In the process of developing an AI strategy, ROI is also an incredibly important consideration for CIOs, because the cost of AI can grow exponentially over time. Gartner found that 74% of organizations are breaking even or losing money from AI investments. AI deployments cost organizations an average of $1.9 million to start, which doesn’t include ancillary costs such as training staff or managing AI.
In addition to cost, CIOs need to weigh which vendors to work with. For example, CIOs deploying massive AI rollouts should rely on hyperscalers such as AWS, Microsoft, or Google. CIOs focused on industry-specific use cases should consider working with startups, Gartner said. Regional regulations can also present data sovereignty considerations and affect which AI tools CIOs can deploy.
Upskilling for AI
Even if CIOs get the “AI readiness” piece right, they still need to ensure that their workforce is onboard with AI and skilled in using it.
“In fact, 71% of CIOs and IT leaders report that their workforce is not ready for AI. Why? Because AI unleashes a toxic mix of a steep learning curve and the primal fear that AI is going to replace us,” Mullery said.
Fortunately for employees, Gartner found in a September 2025 study that only 1% of headcount reductions are directly related to AI. Moving forward on human readiness and capturing the value of AI means organizations should consider whether they need a talent or value remix. This means organizations should determine whether AI should be used to replace low performers or to boost corporate values like revenue growth and backlog reduction, said the analysts.
In addition, organizations need to balance reskilling employees to use AI with ensuring that they don’t exhibit skill atrophy by increased reliance on the technology, said the analysts. It’s important that employees retain critical thinking skills.
“Decide what work humans should do and what work AI should not, and use AI to leverage knowledge in new ways,” Mullery said.
Utilizing AI to achieve both more autonomous operations and a more efficient workforce isn’t simple, but it represents an extraordinary opportunity for CIOs.
“The golden path isn’t easy, but walking it may be one of the most rewarding times in your career. You decide the future, not AI,” Mullery said.
