Marketing and advertising agencies’ ability to tap into the seemingly boundless opportunities of generative AI is running into a stubborn human obstacle: the lack of AI expertise and employee concerns of obsolescence. A new Forrester report, The State Of Generative AI Inside US Agencies, 2024, shows that among the top challenges to adopting AI is concerns for employee expertise and readiness, which we defined as lack of necessary skills or training and employee cultural resistance.
Agencies, technology partners, universities, trade groups, and even award shows need to rise to the occasion to reskill, invest in retraining, and support the creative workforce as it learns to incorporate AI as part of the creative team. This can be accomplished at the university level, in formal training, via technology/software certification, and through informal on-the-job training.
To embrace the first meaningful innovation of its creative process and business model in decades, the industry should commit to invest in every employee inside an agency or marketing organization and every student pursuing an advertising or marketing degree. This will help agencies — which are currently leading in AI adoption and innovation — maintain their edge and bring elevated value to their clients in the form of agency algorithms powered by creativity.