Gartner Survey Finds Only 13% of CIOs Say Their Enterprise Has Realized Significant or Transformational Value from AI

The survey found 58% of CIOs face increased pressure to deliver cost improvement from AI.

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10/19/2026 - 12:00 PM EDT

CIOs Must Strive to be Vanguards, a Cohort That Delivers Better Business Outcomes While Also Reporting High CEO-Perceived AI Value

ORLANDO, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Only 13% of CIOs reported their enterprise has realized significant or transformational value from AI so far according to Gartner, Inc., a business and technology insights company. While AI use cases have accelerated over the past two years, the likelihood of use case success remains one-in-five.

Speaking at Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo in Orlando today, Alicia Mullery, VP Analyst at Gartner, said, “Volume is not value. AI is creating a reckoning for organizations that lack fundamental disciplines, such as defining use-case value ahead of time and establishing criteria for when to walk away.”

The Gartner 2027 CIO and Technology Executive Agenda survey of 2,002 CIOs and technology executives from May to July 2026 found that vanguards, defined as CIOs who are delivering better performance on business outcomes while also reporting high CEO-perceived AI value, are more likely to establish stopping rules at two points in the lifecycle: pilots and production. Defining these guidelines becomes essential as organizations rapidly transition from initial experimentation to active deployment across GenAI, traditional AI and AI agents.

Organizations with guidelines for determining when an AI pilot should not move to production are 2.3 times more likely to be vanguards, while those with guidelines for abandoning low-value AI initiatives already in production are 2.6 times more likely to be vanguards. However, only 31% and 17% of CIOs, respectively, reported having these practices in place.

“Establishing and adhering to these criteria is a team sport,” said Mullery. “CIOs need business partners who are willing and ready to walk away from low value investments.”

CIOs Must Be Responsible for AI Economic Stewardship
Funding for AI is increasing, and 58% of CIOs said they have increased pressure to deliver cost improvement from AI. At the same time, 51% of CIOs expected AI to increase the total cost of ownership of technology solutions (see Figure 1). CIOs need to help their organizations govern AI economics across the full lifecycle, not simply approve an initial technology purchase.

Figure 1: Changes in Technology Funding, 2026 to 2027
“Many organizations continue to apply funding and governance models designed for traditional technology investments such as cloud and SaaS,” said Mullery. “Unlike traditional technology costs, which are largely predictable, AI costs are probabilistic and determined at run time. As enterprise technology funding shifts towards GenAI and agentic AI while investments in legacy infrastructure contract, CIOs will need new approaches to funding, governance and cost accountability.”

CIOs Must Bridge the IT Workforce Gap by Expanding What Humans Do
Organizations with explicit plans to redesign roles for a human-agent workforce are 2.4 times more likely to be vanguards, yet a significant execution gap exists, as only 4% of CIOs reported having such plans in place.

“While many leaders assume AI will primarily serve to reduce technology headcount, the true vanguard differentiator lies in workforce redesign,” said Mullery.

This workforce transformation provides the essential foundation for understanding headcount trends: as AI lowers the cost and effort required to produce technology, overall demand for technology work actually increases. This creates a dual workforce shift where IT headcount can grow, with 40% of respondents expecting to increase IT headcount in 2027, particularly in cybersecurity and data and analytics (see Figure 2), while roles simultaneously compress and expand.

Figure 2: Expected Changes in Headcount within IT Functional Sub-teams Within 12 Months (Percentage of Respondents)
“Rather than maintaining static job definitions, Vanguards recognize that as AI takes on specialized tasks, the boundaries between established technology jobs begin to blur,” said Mullery. “For example, designers can increasingly perform testing activities, while testers participate in design. Consequently, organizations will require fewer distinct role types, even as the span of responsibility within each role expands.”

Additional Insights Available
Gartner clients can read more in Bridging the AI Trough: 3 Gaps To Close for the 2027 CIO and Technology Executive Agenda.

Non clients can learn more here.

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Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo
Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo is the world's most important gathering for CIOs and other IT executives. CIOs and IT executives rely on these conferences to learn how to become agents of change in their organizations and harness AI for successful digital transformation. Follow news and updates from the conference on X and LinkedIn using #GartnerSYM, and on the Gartner Newsroom.

Upcoming dates and locations for Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo include:
November 4-6, 2026 | Yokohama, Japan
November 9-12, 2026 | Barcelona, Spain
November 16-18, 2026 | Kochi, India

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About Gartner
Gartner (NYSE: IT) delivers actionable, objective business and technology insights that drive smarter decisions and stronger performance on an organization's mission-critical priorities. To learn more visit gartner.com.