Dive Brief:
- CMOs are experiencing cognitive dissonance when it comes to artificial intelligence, recognizing the technology as transformative but failing to change their ways of working to master it, according to new Gartner research Marketing Dive can exclusively share.
- Nearly two-thirds of marketers expect AI to fundamentally alter their jobs, but only 32% believe there is a need for significant personal skills updates. Dissonance stems from viewing AI as an efficiency tool versus a strategic growth driver, delegating AI ownership to IT teams and holding onto legacy digital-era thinking.
- There is skepticism that CMOs can meet the moment, with only 15% of CEOs believing their marketing leaders are AI-savvy in 2026. While CMOs are overly fixated on how automation might rejigger their teams, the bigger threat may be to their own relevance and roles.
Dive Insight:
CMOs could be missing the forest for the trees when it comes to AI. While marketers are aware of the impact the technology carries on their businesses at large, they are not investing enough in personal growth and learning new capabilities, Gartner argues. By 2027, a lack of AI literacy will be a top-three reason large enterprise CMOs are replaced, the researcher predicts.
Even as 65% of CMOs agree that AI will shake up marketing, 20% believe no change is needed for their personal skills and 48% only see minor changes needed in the next two years. Tunnel vision persists despite CEOs expressing fairly low confidence in CMOs’ AI finesse, raising the question of whether business chiefs will ultimately see the marketing appointment as replaceable.
“This gap is not merely about skills; it represents a significant erosion of trust and credibility, leading CEOs to question the strategic value of marketing leadership and putting the function’s role as a growth driver at risk,” reads Gartner’s report.
A lack of self-awareness among marketing decision-makers could stem from a few areas. CMOs’ first exposure to AI tends to be in content generation, analytics and workflow automation, creating the impression that AI is primarily a productivity tool instead of something more substantial. CMOs who entered the industry amid the shift to digital marketing perceive AI as an extension of that narrative versus its own thread of disruption. CMOs are also prone to delegating stewardship of AI to IT departments with historic ownership of platform, security and compliance duties.
The end result of these patterns is a swath of CMOs who misunderstand AI fundamentals. Gartner surveyed 402 senior marketing leaders in North America and Europe between August and October of last year for its findings.
Some CMOs believe large-language models spit out responses based on facts instead of patterns, and can overlook the technology’s penchant for sharing false information, or “hallucinations.” Additionally, many CMOs still view AI as a one-off tool and are not taking the time to learn more complex prompt engineering skills that can prevent generic or low-quality outputs. CMOs also do not provide enough scrutiny into generative AI capability claims from their agency partners, according to Gartner.
“The leaders who will thrive will prioritize a small set of high-impact use cases tied to measurable outcomes, build fluency in model limitations and institutionalize output validation,” said Lizzy Foo Kune, distinguished vice president analyst at Gartner’s marketing practice, in a statement. “They should also hold agencies accountable for governance and demonstrated value, and convene a C-suite community of practice to accelerate experimentation and alignment to enterprise priorities.”
Some of the ambivalence around fully embracing AI could come from marketers looking to safeguard the future of their jobs. The technology, despite rapid advancements, can still come up frustratingly short in many respects. Then there is the cost factor to consider: Even the most well-resourced platforms are receiving strong pushback for the amount they are spending on AI development and greater pressure to deliver results.
Marketers’ fight for more resources and budgets is well-documented and could further affect the AI adoption conversation. Separate research published by Gartner earlier this month showed 84% of brands are trapped in a “doom loop,” where underfunded marketing measurement makes it harder to prove results, thus leading to tighter future budget allocations.
