Author:
IBM
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Language:
English

The CEO's Guide To Generative AI: What You Need To Know And Do To Win With Transformative Technology

January 2025
Digital

Just how fast can an organization evolve? Generative AI is pushing CEOs to find out.

When the pace of change accelerates to breakneck speeds, businesses begin to strain under the pressure. Bottlenecks cause back-ups. Organizational structures buckle. Growth engines stall.

In this environment, CEOs say business model innovation is the top challenge they must overcome. For many, reinvention is the only option. To ensure their organizations will achieve operational excellence no matter how hard the winds of change blow, CEOs must be ready to rip faulty support structures down to the foundation and rebuild.

Gen AI can power this revolution. Over the next three years, executives say traditional and gen AI will support business and operating model innovation by providing access to additional data (88%), generating new insights from existing data (86%), expanding access to new markets (85%), and accelerating product and services development (84%).

It will supercharge people and skyrocket productivity, shifting business from a labor-based model to one that is asset-enabled. It will also open up new markets by enabling workers to create high-value solutions that previously weren’t feasible or affordable.

The key is selecting use cases that drive value—and not spreading the organization too thin. Rather than looking broadly at applications and opportunities, CEOs should ask how gen AI can help solve the company’s biggest problems. The leaders that win the day will be the ones who stay aligned to their strategic plans and execute the fastest.

To see how executives are making the most of this rapidly evolving technology, the IBM Institute for Business Value (IBM IBV) interviewed more than 10,000 CEOs and other members of the C-suite globally in 2023 and 2024. We asked them where they expect gen AI to make the biggest impact, how they plan to invest, and what obstacles they will need to overcome along the way.

Our findings paint the future in an auspicious light. These insights highlight a multitude of new challenges, but also showcase strategies that can help CEOs capitalize on the gen AI moment.

This book combines IBM’s decades of experience working with clients to apply AI and other technologies in meaningful ways with the results of our ongoing rapid-response research. IBM’s long history of using technology to make the world work better puts us in a unique position to help executives make gen AI work FOR them, rather than becoming something that happens TO them.

Explore the following 22 chapters, packed full of potential applications and action items, to learn how gen AI can redefine your customer and employee engagement strategies, accelerate enterprise transformation with data-driven tech, and build resilient operations for a future defined by disruption and change.

Contents:

**AI-powered data and technology **

  • Digital product engineering IT automation 9
  • AI model optimization
  • Cost of compute
  • Platforms, data, and governance
  • Open innovation and ecosystems
  • Application modernization
  • Responsible AI and ethics
  • Tech spends

**AI-fueled operations **

  • Enterprise operating model
  • Business process automation for operations
  • Finance
  • Procurement
  • Risk management
  • Physical asset management
  • Supply chain
  • Marketing
  • Cybersecurity
  • Sustainability

AI-enabled people

  • Talent and skills
  • Customer service
  • Customer and employee experience

Conclusion

Continue reading...

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The CEO's Guide To Generative AI: What You Need To Know And Do To Win With Transformative Technology

January 2025
Digital

Just how fast can an organization evolve? Generative AI is pushing CEOs to find out.

When the pace of change accelerates to breakneck speeds, businesses begin to strain under the pressure. Bottlenecks cause back-ups. Organizational structures buckle. Growth engines stall.

In this environment, CEOs say business model innovation is the top challenge they must overcome. For many, reinvention is the only option. To ensure their organizations will achieve operational excellence no matter how hard the winds of change blow, CEOs must be ready to rip faulty support structures down to the foundation and rebuild.

Gen AI can power this revolution. Over the next three years, executives say traditional and gen AI will support business and operating model innovation by providing access to additional data (88%), generating new insights from existing data (86%), expanding access to new markets (85%), and accelerating product and services development (84%).

It will supercharge people and skyrocket productivity, shifting business from a labor-based model to one that is asset-enabled. It will also open up new markets by enabling workers to create high-value solutions that previously weren’t feasible or affordable.

The key is selecting use cases that drive value—and not spreading the organization too thin. Rather than looking broadly at applications and opportunities, CEOs should ask how gen AI can help solve the company’s biggest problems. The leaders that win the day will be the ones who stay aligned to their strategic plans and execute the fastest.

To see how executives are making the most of this rapidly evolving technology, the IBM Institute for Business Value (IBM IBV) interviewed more than 10,000 CEOs and other members of the C-suite globally in 2023 and 2024. We asked them where they expect gen AI to make the biggest impact, how they plan to invest, and what obstacles they will need to overcome along the way.

Our findings paint the future in an auspicious light. These insights highlight a multitude of new challenges, but also showcase strategies that can help CEOs capitalize on the gen AI moment.

This book combines IBM’s decades of experience working with clients to apply AI and other technologies in meaningful ways with the results of our ongoing rapid-response research. IBM’s long history of using technology to make the world work better puts us in a unique position to help executives make gen AI work FOR them, rather than becoming something that happens TO them.

Explore the following 22 chapters, packed full of potential applications and action items, to learn how gen AI can redefine your customer and employee engagement strategies, accelerate enterprise transformation with data-driven tech, and build resilient operations for a future defined by disruption and change.

Contents:

**AI-powered data and technology **

  • Digital product engineering IT automation 9
  • AI model optimization
  • Cost of compute
  • Platforms, data, and governance
  • Open innovation and ecosystems
  • Application modernization
  • Responsible AI and ethics
  • Tech spends

**AI-fueled operations **

  • Enterprise operating model
  • Business process automation for operations
  • Finance
  • Procurement
  • Risk management
  • Physical asset management
  • Supply chain
  • Marketing
  • Cybersecurity
  • Sustainability

AI-enabled people

  • Talent and skills
  • Customer service
  • Customer and employee experience

Conclusion