Ready for AI? It’s a little complicated

More than three years into the AI revolution, the technology’s capacity for transforming work is becoming clearer—but many early promises aren’t panning out.

Dallas Dolen, a technology principal with PwC, told IT Brew earlier this month that professional anxiety about AI is a real phenomenon. In 2026, he expects to see both workers and AI providers reset their expectations and guidance around the technology.

“The excitement might be lower by virtue of the fact that there might be some level of sober commentary coming in,” Dolen said. “A tempered impact on a tempered job market—the impact on the economy could be challenging from that point of view. But I think we’re going to have a lot of clarity in 2026.”

AI is enabling workers across sectors of the economy to manage their tasks more efficiently, Dolen believes; rather than taking jobs, AI is changing the way people work.

Counting down. The data backs that assertion up. Recent surveys from Unisys, Wave Connect, and ManpowerGroup show that AI is changing how we work, not necessarily that we work.

In its 2026 Top IT Insights Report, Unisys found that industry experts believe that quality will improve due to A, and that mass layoffs and position reductions are not expected.

That appears to be translating into company decision-making. Wave Connect, a company that allows people to share and manage digital business cards, shared data with IT Brew showing that roles specifically tailored to AI and machine learning make up 18.25% of job categories, more than any other single skill.

Steady on. But there are growing pains, too. Employment agency ManpowerGroup’s Global Talent Barometer shows there’s a crisis of confidence among staffers when it comes to employment and AI. While AI is increasingly integrated into work, employee confidence is dropping.

ManpowerGroup researchers found that AI use has increased 13% year over year, even as confidence in the technology has dropped by 18%. That can have consequences on how the technology is used in the workplace despite accelerating adoption, said VP of Global Insights Mara Stefan.

“Confidence is starting to collapse because workers are really not getting the training, the context, or the support that they need, even though they’re being given the tools,” Stefan said. “It’s not a technology gap, it’s this anxiety of not having the right context, training, or support.”

That confidence may still come, part of the AI ROI that Dolen and Stefan both expect will define 2026. With patience, there will be a payoff, Stefan told IT Brew.

“The disruption is real, but the productivity and the ROI gains are not yet being felt in most organizations,” Stefan said. “It’s going to be in the systems and the processes and the way organizations reset themselves that will help see some of these improvements in new technologies like generative AI.”