How the Workforce Learns Gen AI: See What 2,700 Leaders Say

Tom Schultz

Donnerstag, 29. Mai 2025

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As artificial intelligence continues to reshape the workplace, the urgency to adapt learning strategies is profound.

Yet the reality uncovered in our Degreed report How the Workforce Learns Gen AI in 2025 is stark: 68% of professionals say their organizations offer little or no structured support for learning generative AI—forcing most employees to “go it alone” and putting enterprise-scale adoption at risk.

This comes as 66% of employees are still at the most foundational levels of AI readiness. For CLOs, Talent Leaders, and HR strategists, this gap presents a strategic opportunity to reimagine workforce learning as a lever for competitive advantage.

The Self-Directed Shift

In partnership with Harvard Business Publishing, we collected more than 2,700 responses among senior and mid-level leaders globally across various regions and sectors. The goal? Find out how employees develop AI skills—and what organizations can do to create an AI-fluent workforce, unlocking generative AI’s full potential.

“AI impacts the entire organization,” said Lisa Tenorio, Senior Vice President for Product & Innovation at Harvard Business Publishing, who previewed the study at Degreed LENS 2025. “It’s not just one functional area of the business. Everyone at every level of the company needs some fluency with AI. And they need to be continuously learning to keep pace with the rapid evolution of technology. So that means both learners and learning programs need to adapt and keep pace.”

We found employees aren’t waiting for permission to get smarter. Many are actively exploring AI and other emerging tools on their own time. Through hands-on experimentation with Gen AI and other emerging tools, today’s workforce is signaling a strong demand for agile, personalized learning.

But self-motivation alone isn’t enough. Without clear guidance and structure, the risk of misinformation, wasted time, and disengagement grows. In fact, 40% of employees exploring AI on their own report feeling overwhelmed or uncertain about how to apply it, according to the report.

Enablers of AI Fluency

To support meaningful transformation, forward-thinking organizations prioritize key enablers, among them:

• Support from Leadership: Transformation efforts don’t succeed without executive sponsorship. Learning initiatives thrive when leaders visibly support and participate in them—not just through words, but through action. Modeling learning behaviors, allocating time and budget, and directly linking learning to business goals are key. Yet respondents indicated only 13% of organizations currently support all three enablers of AI fluency—leadership, tools, and environment—in tandem.
  
• Tools and Technology: Modern platforms must do more than distribute content. They need to make learning discoverable, personal, and actionable. That means delivering AI-powered nudges, integrating with day-to-day workflows, and supporting experimentation through coaching, simulations, and role-based guidance. Technology should reduce friction and bring learning into the flow of work—at scale and with precision.
  
• The Learning Environment: A strong learning environment builds psychological safety, encourages experimentation, and treats skill development as a continuous priority. It thrives on peer learning and feedback. Organizations that foster this kind of environment see greater confidence among employees using Gen AI. Without it, even the best tools and intentions fall short.

These enablers are interdependent. When all are in place, organizations accelerate adoption, reduce fear, and turn learning into a strategic growth engine.

“AI fluency isn’t just about individual learning,” Tenorio said. “It’s higher when there is the support, infrastructure, and readiness.”

Barriers Stifling Progress

Right now, 73% of executive and board leaders receive zero formal Gen AI training. When the C-suite is flying blind on Gen AI, investment stalls and risk appetite shrinks. Similarly, only one in ten companies fund AI learning at the level a true transformation demands.

Even with strategic intent, many companies hit roadblocks. A lack of direction, limited resources, and fear of change continue to stifle progress.

For HR and L&D leaders, these are cues to lead, a mandate to close the leadership confidence gap and build the learning infrastructure that unlocks Gen AI productivity and innovation.

AI Fluency: Why Now

AI is moving fast. Waiting to build fluency isn’t just risky. It could be a missed opportunity to engage top talent, accelerate productivity, and create business agility.

Learning must be reframed as a core business function—a tool for enabling transformation, not reacting to it. For leaders managing constant change, fluency isn’t just a capability. It’s a relief.

In our study, one-third of respondents report using Gen AI makes a significant positive impact on their team’s performance. Nearly 8-in-10 say it allows them to focus on higher-level strategic work. And 53% feel better positioned to solve business problems.

In addition, internal mobility is emerging as a powerful incentive. Workers who feel they can grow in their role are significantly more likely to stay. By supporting upskilling, AI readiness, and personalized development, organizations can reduce attrition, boost morale, and maximize their existing talent investments.

How Leading Organizations Are Scaling AI Fluency

Companies making meaningful progress share a common thread: They start with crystal-clear leadership alignment then scale with purpose.

Take, for example, one Europe-based food and beverage manufacturing powerhouse with hundreds of factories and thousands of consumer brands. It launched its Gen AI journey in the boardroom, running hands-on “bootcamp” workshops for senior executives to develop product prototypes using eight different AI tools. That top level experience unlocked cross-functional academies that shortened a product prototyping decision cycle from nearly six months to only two days, proving the ROI of a test-and-learn approach that fuels Gen AI confidence.

Clients across industries are using Degreed to scale learning fast.

Consider Ericsson: Five years ago, the telecom giant began upskilling a relatively small group of 300 scientists to use artificial intelligence. Now, more than 30,000 of the company’s 100,000-plus employees are considered very proficient in AI.

Capgemini faced a dual challenge: Build a workforce that’s ready to help clients put Gen AI to work and integrate AI into internal operations. Built and deployed in only 10 weeks, the company’s Generative AI Campus powered by Degreed made AI learning available to 340,000 global Capgemini employees, giving them what they needed to be AI-ready for internal and client-facing initiatives. A whopping 91,000 employees trained on AI tools in just six months.

Making Learning a Strategic Asset

Too often, learning is treated as an isolated function. But when embedded across the employee lifecycle—from onboarding to leadership development—it becomes a growth engine. Tools like Degreed help HR and L&D teams turn insight into action by surfacing skill gaps, personalizing pathways, and tracking progress in real time.

Moving Forward

Workforce transformation doesn’t begin with a platform. It begins with purpose.

What does success look like for your workforce, and what capabilities will it take to get there? For organizations prioritizing agility, engagement, and resilience, the answer starts with learning.

Degreed is uniquely positioned to turn learning into your organization’s competitive advantage.

Degreed empowers you to:

• Pinpoint needs using data and AI to identify skills gaps and priorities
• Personalize development through automated, curated learning experiences
• Measure change with clear, credible metrics that show impact

In a world of constant change, learning isn’t just how people grow. It’s how companies win.

Go deeper.

Be the first to get access to our How the Workforce Learns Gen AI in 2025 report, packed with data-backed insights to help you lead with confidence in an AI-driven world.

Ready to find out even more? Let’s discuss building AI fluency at scale across your organization.