A Study of 3,000 CEOs Told Me: Productivity Is Finally Back at Number One

A while ago, I opened my inbox and found a fresh CEO survey.

It was conducted by the IBM Institute for Business Value, together with Oxford Economics. They went to 30+ countries, covered 24 industries, and sat down with 3,000 CEOs. Plus an extra sample of 200 U.S. CEOs focused on generative AI.

This is the 28th edition of their C-Suite series.

I figured I'd just flip through it casually. But then I hit a set of numbers that stopped me cold.

One: Productivity Jumped from Sixth Place to First

The study asked CEOs: what are your company's most important priorities for the future?

Back in 2022, productivity ranked sixth.

And this time?

First. Nearly half (48%) of CEOs listed it as their number-one priority.

Who's right behind in second place? Technology modernization (45%).

Then come the usual suspects — growth, customer experience, supply chain, and so on.

Think about it — what does that mean?

CEOs have been talking about "efficiency" and "cost-cutting" for years. Now, finally, in 2026, it has become something the person at the top is genuinely betting on. And they've already figured out: the productivity equation has to be solved with technology.

My god.

Two: Whoever Has the Most Advanced Generative AI Wins

So what technology?

There's one line in the study I read three times over:

Three out of four CEOs (75%) believe that whoever has the most advanced generative AI holds the competitive advantage.

In other words, three out of four people are betting that generative AI is the make-or-break factor in this fight.

And they're not just talking.

Half of all CEOs (50%) have already embedded generative AI into their own products and services.

43% are using it for strategic decisions.

36% are using it for operational decisions.

The chips are already on the table.

Three: But the Troops Below Are Not Ready at All

The story should sail smoothly from here. The CEO is determined and moving fast — the ranks just need to follow.

But the next set of data pours cold water all over that optimism.

On the CEO side: 69% believe generative AI can benefit the entire company.

But on the non-CEO executive side?

Only 30% say their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

The CEOs say: let's go.

The teams below say: hold on, we don't really understand this yet.

Here's an even more sobering number:

Only 29% of executive teams believe their company has enough talent to absorb generative AI.

What does that mean?

In a sentence: the determination is at the top, but the capability is still somewhere below the middle.

The CEO looks up and sees a gold mine, but the road to it hasn't been built yet.

Four: CEOs Are Also Nervous — Afraid of Two Things

You might ask: if they're this optimistic, why aren't CEOs moving even faster?

Because there are two stones pressing on their chests.

The first: data security. 57% of CEOs worry about this.

The second: bias and accuracy. 48% of CEOs worry about this.

Generative AI is the kind of thing that can write poetry and also make things up. It can help you make decisions, and it can also accidentally leak your most critical customer data.

These fears are real.

Jesus Mantas, IBM's Global Managing Partner, said something in the report. My rough translation of his meaning:

Generative AI can unleash a new wave of productivity, efficiency, and service quality across every industry. But before diving in, CEOs need to think through data privacy, intellectual property protection, security, algorithmic accountability, and governance.

In plain terms: it's not that they don't want to charge ahead — it's that they need to fasten their seatbelts first.

Five: The Workforce Reshuffle Has Already Begun

If you think this is just PowerPoint talk, you'd be wrong.

There's one number in the study that gave me a jolt:

43% of CEOs say they have already laid off employees or reassigned roles because of generative AI.

Right after that, 28% plan to make further moves in the next 12 months.

Combined, seven in ten have already moved or are about to.

But wait.

In the same survey, there's another number:

46% of CEOs say they've hired new people because of generative AI.

26% plan to keep hiring.

You see — cutting on one side, hiring on the other. That's the most real picture of this wave.

It's not a simple story of "AI is stealing jobs." It's that jobs are being redistributed. Old roles get washed away; new ones surface. The question is: can the people on the side that's getting washed away make it to the other side?

Six: The Most Ironic Set of Numbers

Alright, the story's gotten this far. You might think: since CEOs are this invested, surely their organizations have thought through "the impact of AI on employees" crystal clear, right?

Not exactly.

The study asked: have you assessed the potential impact of generative AI on your workforce?

CEOs who answered "already assessed": just 28%.

Less than a third.

36% said they plan to assess it in the next 12 months.

Add those two together, and it means: more than a third of companies haven't even put this on the agenda.

One hand is at the front lines, moving troops around — cutting here, hiring there.

The other hand is in the back office, not even having figured out "what our army will look like after this battle."

This is the biggest perception gap I've seen in this entire AI wave.

Seven: Decision-Making Power Is Quietly Shifting Too

There's a subplot in the study that's easy to miss. But it's actually quite important.

CEOs were asked: in the next three years, who will be calling the shots on the most critical decisions in your company?

The answers:

• COO (Chief Operating Officer): 62%
• CFO (Chief Financial Officer): 52%
• CIO (Chief Information Officer): 38% — a year ago this was just 19%. It doubled.
• CTO / CDO: 30%

See the pattern?

The money people, the operations people, the technology people — these are becoming the three most important figures beside the CEO.

The CIO in particular — in one year, their influence has doubled.

What's behind this?

It's that CEOs have finally realized: this fight requires crunching the numbers (CFO), executing on the ground (COO), and understanding the technology (CIO). The era of the CEO calling the shots alone is over.

Eight: Finally, Three Things I Want to Say

First, the priority on productivity has shifted. This isn't just an ordinary survey — it's the collective judgment of 3,000 CEOs. When a group of the sharpest people push the same thing to number one, every businessperson should stop and think hard for five minutes.

Second, the gap between determination and capability. The CEO is fired up; the team is cooling down. If your company is like this, the real investment shouldn't be buying yet another AI tool — it should be closing the capability gap on your team first.

Third, jobs are being reshuffled. Stop asking "will AI replace me?" and start asking "what do the new jobs look like, and can I land one?"

There's a detail from the study I held back — let me add it here:

For the fourth year in a row, CEOs say technology is the single biggest external force that will impact their company over the next three years.

Not macroeconomics.

Not geopolitics.

Technology.

Four years of saying the same thing means it's not a passing breeze — it's the climate.

When the climate changes, you change your wardrobe. That's not trend analysis; that's common sense.

I hope that after reading these numbers, you too will stop cold on at least one of them.

And after the pause — fill the capability gaps, run the assessments.

In this wave, the winners aren't the ones waiting to be swept away. They're the ones who first see which way the water is flowing.