Generative AI success requires innovation culture and data literacy, experts say

Experts stress that effective adoption of artificial intelligence, especially generative AI, hinges on building an innovation‑driven culture and ensuring data literacy across organizations. A CGI Voice of Our Clients survey of 1,764 executives found AI to be the top innovation investment for the next three years, with 57 % already testing or piloting AI, while data management, governance and quality rank among the highest data‑strategy priorities.

Key cultural attributes include agility – the ability to respond quickly to new AI opportunities, flexibility – having talent that can be up‑skilled and redeployed, and motivation – fostering excitement and incentives around AI projects. Illustrating this, a large communications firm that invested in a dedicated GenAI R&D team was able to launch a proof‑of‑concept AI‑driven SQL query generator, accelerating its market innovation.

In the realm of urban design, generative AI tools such as large language models are increasingly used to create city concepts, prompting calls for frameworks that keep human values and decision‑making central to the design process.