David Forry on Why AI Adoption Rates Measure Activity, Not Outcomes

In this episode of Leading Indicators, Curtis Forbes sits down with David Forry, Senior Vice President and Principal Analyst at Brandon Hall Group, for a conversation about the question that should follow every AI adoption number: what does that actually tell us?

David reads roughly 3,000 award submissions a year, each of which has to list measurable benefits, so he sees what separates AI programs that produce results from programs that produce dashboards. His read is that most organizations are measuring the part that is easiest to count. Adoption is a signal, not an outcome, and the pilots that skipped the link to business outcomes are the ones that struggled to get funded a second time.

The conversation covers why a skill listed on a profile is a hypothesis until a manager, an assessment, or a simulation confirms it, and why two employees who look identical in the system can be nowhere near equally ready for change. David shares the story of a manufacturing company that ran three major change initiatives in one year and managed only one of them from HR, and a survey result that could not say whether employees distrusted the CEO or their own manager. He also makes the case that governance should work like a fence in a yard, giving people the confidence to move freely inside it, and he shares what he is tired of seeing on the HR Tech floor this year.

About the Guest

David Forry is Senior Vice President and Principal Analyst at Brandon Hall Group, where he has spent nearly a decade helping organizations navigate workforce transformation. With more than 15 years in Human Capital Management, David works with HR and business leaders to turn workforce data, research and emerging practices into better business decisions. His current research focuses heavily on AI transformation, workforce intelligence, skills, HR operating models and the changing relationship between people and technology. He also leads Brandon Hall Group’s Excellence Councils, bringing corporate practitioners together to co-create research based on the challenges they are solving inside their organizations. David is a frequent speaker and advisor to senior executives and brings a practical perspective to what is changing in the workplace, what is actually working and where organizations are still struggling to turn strategy into measurable outcomes.