Stagwell’s Code And Theory and The Wall Street Journal teamed on a new report that finds companies investing heavily in AI aren’t realizing good ROI, due to the failure to coordinate people, systems, data and processes. 

It’s not the technology that’s the problem, the report argues, but corporate organizations that haven’t adapted to optimize it properly. It calls this disconnect the “orchestration gap.” 

Ironically, the report asserts, because organizations and their AI tech aren’t in sync, execution happens more slowly, the opposite of why many firms embrace AI to begin with.  

Other unintended consequences include poorer customer experience and brand health. Around three-quarters of the companies surveyed for the report lack a unified customer data and brand architecture, creating inconsistent experiences across channels.  

And only 17% have a formal strategy to ensure AI systems understand and represent their brand correctly. 

Contributing problems: siloed and disconnected culture and teams, data that is fragmented across systems, no centralized architecture connecting AI tools, and legacy workflows that don’t support AI-enabled ways of working. 

Another big issue: unclear ownership of AI initiatives. About one-quarter of organizations admit that no one clearly owns it. But at many companies, CEOs, chief technology officers and CMOs all believe they own it.  

Some key findings: 

“Businesses need clear leadership and an architecture that connects people, systems and data,” stated Dan Gardener, co-founder and executive chairman, Code And Theory. "Orchestration gives the enterprise greater control over how it creates, coordinates and captures value. This is the bridge from AI experimentation to a real return on all of those AI investments.”  

See more from the report here.