CIOs need to better understand AI after many failed AI projects!

projects!

Computerworld.com reported that “Failed implementations of AI technologies are pushing CIOs to step back and try to better understand the technology and its impact before moving ahead, according to analysts and industry experts.” The November 18, 2025 article entitled " Doomed enterprise AI projects usually lack vision” (https://www.computerworld.com/article/4091967/doomed-enterprise-ai-projects-usually-lack-vision.html) included these comments:

McKinsey found that 90% of respondents rely on AI in some form. The highest use is in the insurance industry for information management and service operations, followed by software engineering in the tech sector. AI is also popular in the services sector for information management, and in marketing and sales operations in the consumer goods market.

The areas where AI use has been light include advanced manufacturing, engineering and construction, and pharmaceutical and medical sectors.

Digging deeper, agentic AI is most widely used in the tech sector for software engineering and service operations. IT and knowledge management agents are popular across a broad range of sectors, while inventory management and manufacturing agents are the least used. Surprisingly, HR agents are not widely used across sectors, either.

“Agentic use cases such as service-desk management in IT and deep research in knowledge management have quickly developed,” the management consulting firm said in its study.

In this experimental period, organizations viewing AI as a way to reimagine business will take an early lead, Tara Balakrishnan, associate partner at McKinsey, said in the study. “While many see leading indicators from efficiency gains, focusing only on cost can limit AI’s impact,” Balakrishnan wrote.  

Scalability, project costs, and talent availability also play key roles in moving proof-of-concept projects to production.

What do you think?