How can generative artificial intelligence truly become productive? Only if employees are fully committed to the cause. Because they need to rethink their own processes. These seven steps will empower and inspire teams to embrace the AI transformation.
Expectations for generative artificial intelligence are extremely high. In the US, the UK, Germany and Australia, 69 per cent of companies are embracing AI. However, in day-to-day practice, around 90 per cent find that little is significantly faster or better. These figures come from a recent study by the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England and the Deutsche Bundesbank, published in February 2026. Around 6,000 executives were surveyed.
The fact is that many employees find it more difficult than they expected to delegate tasks to AI. Many only use the tools on an ad hoc basis, failing to recognise the technology’s potential and never moving beyond the experimental phase. How can companies change this?
With these measures, they are moving from initial AI initiatives towards a sustainable transformation:
Without a permanent home in the organization, AI remains a side issue that each department deals with on its own. An AI Center of Excellence (CoE) sets standards, pools knowledge, advises stakeholders and measures progress. A CoE works best when it is multidisciplinary, not just staffed by IT specialists.
Multipliers in the specialist departments demonstrate how to think about and practically apply AI in everyday life. They train and support their colleagues, thereby reducing resistance. These pioneers should be genuinely enthusiastic about AI and are ideally managers.
Many employees have completed level 1 training, the general AI training: What is generative AI and how does prompting basically work? At level 2, employees learn advanced prompting for their specialist area – for example for coding in IT. At level 3, teams work on their own use cases and need anchoring workshops to make progress on specific problems.
The best AI initiatives are not created in meetings. Hackathons create a space in which employees can immerse themselves in a problem and work with the tools, guided by experts. In a very short space of time, employees experience a real sense of achievement, for example when they succeed in simplifying a tedious work step with AI.
AI is developing rapidly. More so than with other topics, change communication should include the latest developments and convey what is really relevant to employees’ everyday lives, e.g. in interviews with internal AI champions who are up to date and can explain AI developments in an exciting way.
What problems are other departments solving with AI, and how are they succeeding? At regular AI marketplace events or AI cafés, employees can be inspired and present their own successes, e.g. once a quarter. The fixed dates spur the teams on to drive their AI initiatives forward.
Mistakes are instructive, but you don’t have to make them all yourself. At Failure Nights, colleagues tell us what they failed at with AI. The events are fun, bring people together and strengthen the culture of error that companies urgently need in the AI transformation.
AI seems to be available at the touch of a button, but it only arrives in everyday life when employees feel that the technology really makes their work easier. The seven measures mentioned above create a sense of achievement and success, generate team dynamics and awaken the ambition to put AI on the road.
Firm Data on AI. NBER Working Paper No. 34836, February 2026, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, Bank of England, Deutsche Bundesbank, Macquarie University.
Artificial Intelligence, Productivity, and the Workforce: Evidence from Corporate Executives. NBER Working Paper No. 34984, March 2026, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, Duke University et al.
How can generative artificial intelligence become truly productive? Only if employees are fully committed to the cause. Because they need to rethink their own processes. These 7 steps will empower and inspire teams to embrace the AI transformation.
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