McKinsey — The state of AI in 2025: Agents, innovation, and transformation
~25 min readPublished November 2025Within ~18 months· McKinsey & Company / QuantumBlack — Global Survey on AI
Estimated time: ~25 min read — for the in-app brief plus opening the primary source.
What this is
McKinsey’s Global Survey on AI (2025 edition): wider use including early agentic AI, with the pilot-to-scale gap still the central executive problem. Specific survey article — not a general insights hub.
Value concentrates where companies redesign workflows, not where they buy the most tools.
- McKinsey’s recurring State of AI survey tracks adoption, value, and organizational practices across functions.
- High performers more often rewire processes, roles, and governance — not only deploy chatbots.
- GenAI use is widespread; capturing enterprise value remains uneven by industry and operating model.
- Talent, risk, and CEO attention show up as correlates of reported value.
Next action: Pick one workflow; write owner, success metric, and kill criteria before adding more seats.
Primary source
Read the full source · published November 2025.
What changes in how you lead
How decision rights, process, and ownership should change.
- Sponsor process redesign in the business case, not tools alone.
- Compare your maturity to peer patterns, not to the vendor’s best customer story.
- Put ‘are we redesigning work?’ on ELT agendas alongside ‘are we using AI?’
Deep dive
The 2025 survey page reports where AI use concentrates and where value still lags.
Track: share of organizations using AI, where value shows up, and what high performers redesign.
Bring one chart and one implication for your function to the next leadership meeting.