Coaches Help Leaders Close The Gap

As organizations invest in AI, many leaders are eager to move from experimentation to widespread adoption. But a perception of readiness at the executive level doesn’t necessarily translate into employee confidence or everyday use. In fact, research by IBM found quite a gap between them: While many CEOs believe their organizations are ready to deploy agentic AI, only a quarter of employees actually use it.

Without the right skills, context and support, workers may struggle to understand where these tools fit into their roles or how to use them effectively. Below, Forbes Coaches Council members explore practical ways for leaders to help employees build the skills and confidence they need to confidently and effectively embrace agentic AI in their work.

Use AI To Think More Deeply

Change the question to, “What needs our attention to improve the business?” Leaders need to stop viewing AI as a productivity tool. AI rewards the human brain for thinking less. The unintended consequence is that humans are often more motivated to create work “slop” rather than address and solve real business challenges. Instead of offloading as much as possible to AI, we humans need to stay involved and use AI to help us think more deeply about solving strategic issues. – Liz Guthridge, Connect Consulting Group

Socialize, Incentivize And Measure

When CEOs socialize the future vision of the “what,” “why” and “how” of agentic AI, and then follow up by incentivizing the adoption and measuring the use of agentic AI, results follow. What gets socialized, measured and incentivized gets done. – Shefali Raina, Alpha Lane Partners

Identify Who Will Use Agentic AI First

Leaders can identify which employees in their workforce will be utilizing the agentic AI first. Unless it’s a systemic platform that encompasses all employees, it’s not uncommon to have different agentic AI needs for different employee segments. Communication and training can then be directed intentionally, with employees first learning how it helps in their role and then learning how to apply it in their role. – Jaclynn Robinson, Nine Muses Consulting, LLC

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Demonstrate Use Rather Than Mandating It

Stop announcing AI strategy from the boardroom. AI adoption isn’t a technology problem—it’s a leadership problem. Don’t mandate it. Demonstrate it. Use AI in every meeting, every decision and every presentation. Culture doesn’t change because of what people are told. It changes because leaders go first. – Nick Leighton, Exactly Where You Want To Be

Make Agentic AI Part Of Everyday Work

Leaders should stop treating AI as a one-time training session and make it part of everyday work. The most effective approach is giving employees practical, role-specific ways to use AI on real tasks, supported by time to experiment and share what’s working. People build confidence by using AI consistently, not by hearing about its potential. – Gwen Mdinaradze, EdBridge

Be Intentional About Which Capabilities AI Augments

Organizations need to be intentional about which capabilities they are augmenting with AI, rather than just deploying AI. If the focus is just on adoption, people will do it, the bills will mount and productivity will not increase. The company landscape and disposition will change (as they change with any technology adoption), and C-level leaders need to be prepared to evolve their management model if they want AI to stick. – João Rosa, João Rosa Consulting

Run A 30-Day Sprint For One Workflow Per Team

Run a 30-day, role-based AI adoption sprint tied to real work. Pick one workflow per team, train people on that use case and assign an internal champion. Then, measure adoption, time saved and quality weekly. Be explicit that AI is there to augment judgment, not quietly replace people. Employees need practice, guardrails, proof and honest answers about how roles may change. – David Ribott, Ribott Partners

Activate Conditions To Bring About Desired Outcomes

Leaders who have to resort to “get their people up to speed” on anything aren’t themselves “up to speed” on how to effectively model, motivate and lead others to better lead themselves. The issue and cause here is not AI deployment. That is a symptom of an impoverished understanding of a leadership role. When it comes to AI or any new initiative, a boss mindset is to push and drive their contributors. Real leaders activate conditions that bring about desired outcomes. – Jay Steven Levin, WinThinking

Look At Agentic AI As A Capability Journey

Leaders need to stop treating agentic AI as a technology rollout and start treating it as a capability journey. There’s no shortcut. Like any skill, it starts with mastering the basics: prompting, building repeatable workflows, refining them and gradually adding complexity with automation. In my workshops, I encourage leaders to roll up their sleeves and learn by doing, both at work and in their personal lives. This confidence is needed to close the capability gap. – Gabriella Goddard, Brainsparker Ltd

Start By Solving A Specific, High-Impact Problem

Never start with a companywide agentic AI rollout. Start with the biggest business bottlenecks and deploy agentic AI where it can solve a specific, high-impact problem. Prove the value, learn from the experience and then scale deliberately. Organizations don’t succeed with agentic AI by rolling it out everywhere at once. They succeed by solving real problems first and letting adoption grow from measurable results. – Stephan Lendi, Newbury Media & Communications GmbH

Teach Employees How To Supervise AI Tools

Using agentic AI is only part of the capability. Employees also need to learn when not to trust it. Treat every AI agent as a junior colleague: Delegate real work, require visible reasoning where possible, review the output and explain corrections. Adoption scales more sustainably when people learn supervision, not just operation, of the tool. – Samuel Rodrigues, Baxtter Corporation

Run Department-Level AI Readiness Surveys

Leaders can close the agentic AI gap by running quick, department-level readiness surveys and comparing results. Start with the teams showing the strongest awareness, build agentic workflows with them, then use their success to support the next group. Scale this pattern companywide for sustained adaptation. Now you have literature for standardized processes for your future AI policies. – Dr. Ari McGrew, Tactful Disruption®

Eliminate The Repetitive Tasks People Dread Doing

Skip companywide AI training for a week. Instead, ask every team to submit one task they really dread doing every Monday. Pick the 10 most repetitive examples and solve only those with AI. People adopt new tools when they eliminate real pain, not when they’re told to “innovate.” Nothing builds momentum faster than seeing an hour-long chore disappear in five minutes. – Alla Adam, Adam Impact Institute

Have Leaders Showcase Tasks They Handed To Agentic AI

Have your executives work in the open. One leader I advised opened every Monday meeting by showing one task he had handed to an agent that week, failures included. Usage tripled in a quarter. Permission is the real bottleneck, and people read permission in what leaders visibly do, never in what they endorse. – Lital Marom, LITAL MAROM

Tie AI Usage To Existing, Specific Goals

I tell CEOs and founders that people adopt AI much faster when it’s tied to a specific goal they’re already trying to accomplish, not simply introduced as another tool to learn. People will always default to what works for them unless you give the “who, what, where, when, why and how” on any procedural changes. – Desiree’ Stapleton, Goal Accomplishment Made Easy

Designate ‘AI Champions’ To Teach And Inspire Peers

Create AI champions within each business unit, not just the IT team. Give them real business problems to solve, then let them demonstrate practical wins to peers. Adoption spreads through trusted colleagues using AI successfully, not through executive announcements or mandatory training alone. – Thomas Lim, Centre for Systems Leadership (SIM Academy)

Help Teams Use AI To Achieve An Immediate Win

Don’t start with the tech; start with the work. Identify one repetitive task where agentic AI can deliver an immediate win, then train teams to use it. When employees experience AI solving a genuine problem instead of just hearing about its potential, adoption, confidence and trust grow faster. – Nathan Mitchell, Lead Empowered LLC

Treat AI As A People Initiative

Leaders need to stop treating AI as an IT rollout and start treating it as a people initiative. Give employees practical training, create safe spaces to experiment and explain how AI supports their work instead of replacing it. Adoption happens when people understand the value, feel confident using the tools and trust the process. Communication is just as important as the technology itself—and so is leading by example. – Kathryn Lancioni, The Gut Punch Podcast