Leaders confident about AI training while employees struggle
A new report reveals a growing disconnect between leaders and employees in their perceptions of their AI preparedness.
Corndel's 2025 Workplace Training Report finds HR leaders are confident about their organization's AI readiness, with 88 percent confident in leadership's ability to guide AI adoption and 60 percent very confident that training programs are equipping employees with the necessary skills for digital transformation.
However, the view from the front lines is less optimistic. While 71 percent of middle managers actively use AI in their daily tasks, 52 percent of employees say they have never used AI tools.
Although 97 percent of HR leaders claim their organizations offer AI training -- and 50 percent believe it to have been comprehensive -- only 39 percent of employees report having received it. Among younger employees, 74 percent use AI tools regularly, but just 52 percent have received formal training -- and only 14 percent rate this training as highly effective. As a result, a third of UK employees surveyed say they feel unprepared to adopt AI in the next one to three years.
Only 55 percent of employees say they trust their managers to lead digital transformation effectively, and just four in 10 believe they can adopt AI tools themselves. This lack of knowledge and access to AI tools threatens to undermine the potential gains that businesses expect from AI adoption.
Interstingly, despite leadership expressing confidence 48 percent of senior leaders admit they haven't yet used an AI tool themselves, compared to 29 percent of middle managers.
"Many senior leaders are being asked to set AI strategies without hands-on experience of the tools themselves," says Sean Cosgrove, chief commercial officer at Corndel. "The National Data Strategy has already flagged the gap in leadership-level data skills, which extends to AI. Leaders don't just need a vision for AI adoption -- they need a real understanding of the skills their workforce requires. For many, even foundational AI skills like crafting effective prompts for generative AI are missing. That’s a gap we need to close."
The study also finds many organizations are focusing their training efforts on narrow groups, such as technical teams or senior leadership, rather than an offering across the broader workforce. Yet, Corndel's report shows that 88 percent of employees using generative AI are in non-technical roles, meaning that the people most likely to use AI day-to-day -- managers, customer service reps, and analysts -- are often receiving the least by way of training.
You can get the full report on the Corndel site.
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