AI adoption numbers are skyrocketing. Boston Consulting Group reports that 74% of front-line employees use AI at least two to three times a week, up from 51% in BCG’s 2025 report.
AI champion programs have played a significant role in driving that growth. By deploying trained internal employees to provide on-the-ground encouragement and training to their peers, organizations are turning skeptics into daily users. Citi’s usage of its internal AI tool has increased from single digits at the time of its initial rollout to more than 80% of its workforce adopting it, and law firm Ropes & Gray increased its use of AI from a few hundred prompts per month to more than 282,000 across 2,200 employees.
But organizations are pushing AI adoption faster than they’re building the guardrails to use it well. One recent survey found that more than half (51%) of employees are receiving conflicting guidance on when and how to use AI at work. Of those using the tools, only 7.5% of employees have received extensive AI training. Another 23% have received no training at all.
Driving adoption is the easy part. Things get more complicated when AI use moves beyond productivity tasks into team workflows, and
