85% of Enterprise Employees Aren’t Using AI to Drive Business Value

Section's latest AI Proficiency Report reveals a critical gap between AI usage and impact - and most executives don't see it

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Section's latest AI Proficiency Report reveals a critical disconnect in enterprise AI: while adoption continues to climb, value remains elusive. The report finds that the vast majority of employees are AI beginners without a valuable AI use case - even as C-suite leaders report confidence in their deployments.

The research evaluated more than 5,000 knowledge workers across the U.S., U.K., and Canada at companies with 1,000+ employees on AI knowledge, usage, skill, attitudes, and organizational readiness, including hands-on assessments of prompting and use case quality.

The research found that, while more than half of the workforce (55%) now uses AI at work at least weekly, 85% of employees do not have an AI use case that delivers business value. 26% don’t use AI for work at all. Fewer than 3% of knowledge workers qualify as AI practitioners or experts – those who can embed AI into workflows and realize meaningful productivity gains.

But most C-suite leaders aren’t aware of this gap between usage and value. In fact, the C-suite largely believes their deployments are succeeding – a sentiment that is significantly at odds with that of individual contributors.

“Most organizations are still doing ‘performative AI’ - roll out some tools, run a lunch and learn, and call it transformation,” said Greg Shove, Section CEO. “But they haven't done the actual work of rethinking how work is done with AI. The result is exactly what we're seeing: everyone has access, almost no one is generating value.”

The proficiency bar has moved - most knowledge workers haven’t

The requirement for value-driving AI use has shifted from basic prompting skill to workflow integration, but most knowledge workers can't effectively do either. The data shows:

• 70% are classified as "AI experimenters," meaning they prompt poorly and use AI for low-value, one-off tasks
• Less than 0.1% have reached expert-level AI use, meaning they automate work with AI to realize significant time savings or impact
• The average knowledge worker scores a 2.3 out of 10 in prompting ability
• Nearly a quarter of workers (24%) report saving no time at all with AI
• 44% save fewer than four hours per week - far below what most organizations need to see ROI

Even among those who receive AI training, proficiency scores average just 40/100, demonstrating that access to resources doesn't guarantee quality outcomes.

“Too many AI initiatives still focus on access and basic prompting,” said Shove. “But the new standard requires employees to use AI in ways that actually change how work gets done - and almost no one is there.”

Executives believe AI efforts are working, the workforce disagrees

The report finds a significant perception gap between the C-suite and the rest of the organization on AI initiatives.

As compared to ICs, the C-suite is:

• 53% more likely to believe their company has a clear AI strategy
• 31% more likely to believe AI adoption is widespread in their company
• 41% more likely to believe employees are encouraged to experiment with AI

This perception gap is matched by a resource gap. Compared to the C-suite, individual contributors are:

• 48% less likely to have access to AI tools
• 54% less likely to receive AI training
• 56% less likely to be reimbursed for AI tools they use at work

Individual contributors are also more likely to feel anxious or overwhelmed by AI (68% vs. 26% of C-suite) and less likely to say it has had a transformative impact on their work (5% vs. 42% of C-suite).

The biggest problem isn’t skill, it’s use cases

While low prompting scores are concerning, analysis of more than 4,500 work-related AI use cases reveals a more fundamental challenge:

• 85% of knowledge workers have beginner AI use cases - or none at all
• Over 25% of reported AI use cases have no application to larger processes or workflows
• Just 15% of use cases are likely to generate any business value at all

The most common AI use case is as a search replacement. Just 2% of use cases were scored as advanced.

Download the full report and then join Section’s COO, Taylor Malmsheimer, tomorrow, January 22nd at 2 pm ET in a live webinar where she’ll unpack the results of the survey and what they mean for enterprise leaders.

About Section

Section is an AI transformation partner that combines software and services to make AI adoption scalable. We work with organizations to benchmark AI proficiency, enable sustained AI use, redesign workflows, and measure business outcomes. Founded in 2019 by Scott Galloway and led by CEO Greg Shove, Section has partnered with more than 150 enterprise organizations on AI transformation.