Bottom Line: Without an explicit implementation strategy, the declared AI competency need remains an abstract goal for three-quarters of DACH enterprises.
75 percent of companies in Germany, Austria and Switzerland plan to bring their non-technical employees to at least a moderate level of AI competency within 24 months. However, many organizations lack a clear strategy for how this competency will be concretely implemented in day-to-day work.
The survey shows that AI tools in the DACH region have become standard tools in enterprises — no longer only for developers and data specialists, but increasingly for commercial, administrative and operational functions as well.
For Chief Data Officers, this means AI competency must become an organizational core competency. The expectation that over 25 percent of their own staff will have solid AI fundamentals by mid-2026 requires a coherent upskilling strategy — from training formats to role models to the definition of use cases in each functional area.
The central problem lies in the implementation gap: while companies formulate the goal, they lack the concrete path for how AI working techniques will actually be productively embedded in sales, HR, finance or marketing. CDOs should therefore clarify soon which AI tools are practically deployable for which roles, where use-case designs with the business are required, and what governance structures (such as in handling proprietary data) must be established.
Source: itwelt.at · Published June 2, 2026
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