Digital Transformation Was Always Human

We’ve spent decades talking about digital transformation. For a while, it was cloud migrations and mobile-first strategies. Now, it’s AI—specifically generative AI. Every boardroom has a slide about it. Every budget line has a placeholder for it. And yet, the latest MIT GenAI Divide: State of AI in Business 2025 report lands with a sobering statistic:

👉 95% of AI pilots have produced no measurable business return.

Despite billions invested, most initiatives never make it past proof of concept.

So what’s going on?

The Hype vs. The Human

Generative AI has been sold as revolutionary. The hype cycles promise automation at scale, effortless productivity, and new markets unlocked. The reality is more modest: small gains in contract processing, summarising emails, or marketing copy. These are useful, but hardly transformational.

Why? Because transformation was always human.

Tools only matter when they align with context, culture, and the messy realities of work. Without governance, integration, and feedback loops, AI is just another pilot gathering dust.

Redundancies, or Role Shifts?

Much has been written about AI and job loss. The report suggests a more complex picture: redundancies aren’t happening at scale. Instead, roles are being reshaped. Jobs demand more cognitive agility, more social skills, more ability to interpret and validate what the machine produces.

In practice, that means we’re not eliminating humans—we’re rebalancing them. Automation trims the edges, but humans still sit at the centre.

The GenAI Divide

MIT calls it the GenAI Divide: a gulf between hype and impact. A small minority of companies (about 5%) are capturing real value. They do this not by chasing flashy pilots, but by:

• Aligning AI tightly with workflows.

• Treating humans as essential, not optional.

• Building governance and feedback systems.

• Prioritising ROI in less glamorous areas like back-office automation.

The rest? They’re stuck in the paradox of massive investment with minimal return.

Still Thinking

This moment reminds me of an older truth: technology doesn’t transform organisations, people do. AI may be new, but the pattern is familiar. We rush in with capital and ambition, then realise the harder work is cultural, strategic, and human.

Digital transformation has always been human transformation. AI doesn’t change that—it only makes it more obvious.

And maybe that’s the point.