86% of Asia Pacific executives are increasing AI investments this year. But only 8% qualify as organizations that can actually scale AI across their operations.
I've read new research from Accenture that puts a number on what many senior leaders already feel: the gap between AI ambition and AI execution is widening.
Companies are spending more on AI tools and platforms, but only a small fraction can implement the technology at an enterprise scale.
The bottleneck is not the technology. It is the people.
APAC executives name skills development as their biggest obstacle to scaling AI. Most organizations have moved past running isolated AI pilots, but they do not have the workforce capability to redesign core business processes around the technology. Buying more tools does not solve that problem.
What this means if you are hiring
You must stop looking for executives who say they "understand AI." That phrase means very little at this point. What you need are leaders who have already led organization-wide capability transformation.
Get executives who have closed the gap between investment and execution, in a real organization, under real pressure. As a headhunter for over 20 years at Tom Sorensen | NPAworlwide, let me tell you that this profile is scarce, and the market is not producing enough of them.
What this means if you are a candidate
AI credentials on a resume do not move the needle anymore.
What hiring companies want to see is evidence that you have built AI-ready teams at scale. Not that you attended the workshops or approved the budget, but that you created the conditions for a workforce to actually change how it works. That is a harder story to tell, and most candidates cannot tell it yet.
The core issue
Organizations are treating AI as a technology procurement decision when it is actually a talent development decision.
The companies pulling ahead are not the ones with the best tools. They are the ones with leaders who build systematic learning cultures and hold the organization accountable for capability growth, not just tool adoption.
One executive in the Accenture research said it directly: "In this era, a month is a very long time."
The question for every leadership team in Asia Pacific right now is simple.
Are you building AI capability as fast as you are buying AI tools?
If the answer is no, it tells you exactly where that leads. Act now.
An article by Tom Sorensen
Managing Partner of Tom Sorensen | NPAworldwide Recruitment
Email: tom.s@tomsorensen.in.th