As AI Comes into Play, Business Models Will Change

23 January 2025 / Article

AI dominates the internal focus for businesses in 2025. It did in 2024, too. And “digital transformation” has been a top priority since 2000—even though it means different things each year. Now, transformation is all about AI and automation. With AI, the objective is to get better at it, get faster at it, and get it delivering results that can be measured.

Key Insights

AI will affect all aspects of the business. The promise of AI is that the underlying powers of machine learning and natural language foundation models can be applied to almost every aspect of any business workflow and improve it. Anything can be made better, faster, smarter, and cheaper. AI also has the power to change business models, which is why CEOs are focused on it. Plan for how the C-Suite can stay abreast of the latest developments of AI both inside and outside the organization.
There is a gap in the belief that companies have the expertise required. Some 45% of CEO respondents rank expertise as the number one impediment to AI adoption, but at the functional level, the CMO/CCO leaders place this lower on their list (number three, at 28%). This might be an indicator that general strategic and executional AI leadership across the enterprise is needed in the eyes of the CEO and/or that functional expertise is not up to CEO expectations.
Change management and a culture of responsible experimentation are required. At our AI event in November 2024, one of the top discussion points was how to drive adoption of new tools, create a culture of responsible innovation, and collaborate across the enterprise to cross-pollinate your own “AI garden.” Transformation requires knowledge, skills, innovative thinking and, most importantly, people who are passionate about the success of your company.
New skills will be needed, and old ones too. It might be surprising to see “customer experience” ranked number four on the focus areas for the CMO/CCO, but this is an indication that the fundamental capabilities of marketers and communicators remain paramount and the present focus is on how AI can amplify these capabilities. The skills needed are a mix of the new and the old—new data skills combined with the 4Ps (product, price, place, and promotion) and corporate communications. Thinking about talent is crucial for M&C leaders: upskilling, recruiting, empowering, and exciting your teams to drive growth, for the company and for themselves, is a challenge in the year ahead.