AI's Organizational Impact: McKinsey's State of Organizations 2026 Report

**Ray Rike** (0:08)
Welcome back to the AI to ROI Podcast, the Big Story Edition. I'm Ray Rike, Founder and CEO of Benchmarkit. And joining me as always is my co-host, Peter Buchanan.

**Peter Buchanan** (0:19)
Yep. I'm Peter Buchanan. I'm managing partner in Newplan. And Ray, it's great to be here. And I have to say that today's episode, I've been wanting to do something like this for a while. And we found a market research report from one of the leading consultancies in the world that is, I think, one of the most significant research pieces on the state of AI in the enterprise.

**Ray Rike** (0:42)
I agree, Peter. McKinsey just published their State of Organization 2026 Report. It's the second edition of what I think is becoming a landmark annual research initiative. And I really like the fact that they surveyed more than 10,000 senior executives across 15 countries, 16 industries. And I think they found some very interesting info.

**Peter Buchanan** (1:04)
Right. Well, you know, when McKinsey calls, you know, people call back. And the central tension in that they identify in the report is, I think, something that every executive dealing with AI has to deal with. The vast majority of organizations are experimenting with AI. We've talked about that a lot. But at the same time, that same vast majority is also reporting no meaningful impact on their bottom line. And that gap is what this episode is actually really about.

**Ray Rike** (1:37)
Okay. So let's talk about the top themes we're going to discuss today. Number one, that AI transformation, it continues to fall short. And specifically, the relationship between humans and AI agents is evolving very rapidly.
Second, what is the geopolitical disruption and the organizational complexity that are costing companies financially? And what does leadership need to look like in the future to navigate all of it? So, hey, let's get right into it and start with the first thing, Peter.

**Peter Buchanan** (2:08)
Yeah. The first thing here, it's the way McKinsey structures the report. And they identify three tectonic forces that they think are just, they're not just headwinds, they're actually structural shifts that are going to affect every mid to large sized company in every industry.

**Ray Rike** (2:31)
Okay. Well, since you did a lot of research on this research, why don't you go ahead and walk us through those three?

**Peter Buchanan** (2:38)
Sure. So the first is technology, specifically AI, duh, and not just generative AI, but the emergence of a genetic AI systems that execute multi-step workflows.
The second is economic and geopolitical fragmentation. So we have a lot more trade conflicts. We have terrifiability. We have declining trust in governments and in capitalism globally. And the third is workforce transformation. So shifting employee expectations, demographic change, and then just a fundamental re-think of what leadership needs to do in this environment. And that's just frankly a ton of things going on at the same time.

**Ray Rike** (3:24)
Yeah. And they're all interdependent. You think about AI could actually free companies from the current human-based geographic constraints. Yeah, you can run virtual global teams and outsource an offshore cognitive work much easier when they're agents versus humans. But at the same time, there's new complexity, particularly around how humans and AI systems will both interact and collaborate.

**Peter Buchanan** (3:52)
Yeah, that's right. I think what really landed with me is a single finding that captures the whole moment, which is that three and four leaders say their organizations are not ready to face what's coming.
And even the leaders who describe themselves as optimistic, only one in three feels prepared. So they're just living under storm clouds or clouds of uncertainty here.

**Ray Rike** (4:19)
Yeah. So you have these leaders and they see the opportunity. You have to be blind not to see the opportunity. And many believe that things are starting and heading in the right direction. But Peter, they don't feel ready. And I think this is a fear of the unknown.
Because I talk to a lot of people who actually have worked in highly successful AI native companies like Lovable and Anthropic. But even they are feeling like they're falling behind because what they knew yesterday may have changed today.
And I think it talks a lot about the magnitude of the challenges that we face, not just today, but heading into tomorrow.

**Peter Buchanan** (5:03)
Right. And it sets up everything else that's in the report. These aren't technology gaps.
They're leadership and organizational gaps. So let's get into the biggest, most data-rich theme in the report, the AI-enabled organization. Because McKinsey has done some very specific research and they have some very specific things to say about why so many AI initiatives are falling short.