Research from Collibra and The Harris Poll suggests organisations are struggling to translate investment in Artificial Intelligence into expected outcomes, with data quality and governance emerging as significant obstacles.
Nearly three-quarters of technology decision-makers believe their organisations’ Artificial Intelligence initiatives are falling short of expectations, according to research from Collibra and The Harris Poll.
The survey found 72% believe current AI initiatives are underperforming, highlighting a gap between investment in the technology and organisations’ ability to generate value from it.
Data foundations are emerging as a significant challenge. The research found technology leaders recognise that AI systems depend on trustworthy, accessible and properly governed organisational data.
Concerns around governance are also becoming more important as organisations move from experimenting with AI towards deploying it across business processes.
The findings indicate that organisations increasingly need to understand where data originates, who owns it and whether it is sufficiently reliable for use by AI applications.
Collibra said businesses risk undermining their AI investments if adoption advances faster than the data governance and quality controls supporting them.
The research also points to growing pressure on technology and data leaders to demonstrate measurable returns from AI rather than focusing primarily on experimentation and deployment.
As organisations expand the use of Generative AI and Agentic AI, Collibra argues that establishing trusted data foundations and governance will become increasingly important to achieving sustainable business outcomes.
