If you have been scrolling through LinkedIn or reading tech headlines lately, you might be under the impression that AI has already revolutionized the global workforce, slashed headcounts by half, and doubled productivity overnight. The fear of missing out (FOMO) among founders and business leaders is palpable.
But the most rigorous international study to date just landed, and it paints a very different picture. It suggests we all need to take a deep breath.
A massive working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)—drawing on data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, the Bank of England, and others—surveyed nearly 6,000 verified executives across four countries. These aren’t estimates from a hype-cycle blog; these are phone-verified insights from CEOs and CFOs cross-checked against macro output figures.
Here is the reality check for your business strategy.
The “Nothing Happened” Surprise
The headline finding contradicts the panic: Over 90% of firms report no measurable change in headcount attributable to AI over the past three years.
Despite 69% of firms using AI (mostly Large Language Models for text and data processing), the immediate impact on jobs has been negligible. This isn’t a failure of the technology; it is a historical pattern. Like the steam engine or the internet, general-purpose technologies go through a “tinkering phase” before they transform the bottom line. Right now, we are just learning how to use the tools.
The Real ROI is Coming (But It’s Incremental)
While the past three years were about experimentation, the next three are about integration. Executives aren’t expecting a miracle, but they are expecting solid, compounded growth.
US executives project a 2.25% productivity gain over the next three years. In economies that have struggled with stagnant growth for a decade, a 2% boost is not just “modest”—it is significant. For a business owner, this means your margins improve not by magic, but by shaving friction off day-to-day workflows.
The “Slow Hire” Strategy
This is the most critical insight for founders planning their workforce. The data shows that while employment might dip slightly (executives expect a modest 0.7% reduction), it won’t look like mass layoffs.
Instead, companies are opting for attrition and slower hiring. In the UK, two-thirds of the adjustment will come from simply not backfilling roles or hiring slower, rather than handing out pink slips. It is a reallocation of resources. You aren’t firing your support team; you just aren’t doubling its size next year. Instead, you are likely hiring for new roles—data governance, model oversight, and service development.
The Great Expectation Gap
There is a fascinating disconnect between the boardroom and the breakroom that you need to manage.
- Employees believe AI will lead to more hiring (+0.5%). They see AI as a tool that helps them do more work, requiring more hands to manage the output.
- Executives expect a slight reduction (-1.2%). They view AI through the lens of cost structures and competitive pressure.
This gap stems from vantage points. Your staff experiences task-level help (the AI wrote the email), while you experience enterprise-level efficiency (we don’t need to outsource that anymore). Bridging this gap requires clear communication—positioning AI as an assistant that stabilizes the business, rather than a replacement.
The Bottom Line
If you feel like you haven’t seen a massive economic shift in your business from AI yet, you are not behind. You are exactly where the market is. The “inflection point” is expected to unfold over the next three years as deployments mature.
The winning move right now isn’t to disrupt your entire company overnight. It is to focus on the boring, incremental integration of these tools into everyday workflows, allowing productivity to compound quietly in the background.
