The news: Agencies are pushing employees to embrace AI, but many marketers don’t have a clue how to use it. Despite 69% of marketers saying their companies “strongly encourage” AI use, nearly half (43%) say they’ve never had formal training on it, per an Adweek and NewtonX survey of 500 marketers. Of those who have, only 10% said it was adequate.

Regarding organizational AI policies, 43% of marketers said that their company’s guidelines were not clear at all or only slightly clear; 11% didn’t know if their company had policies in place.

The trend: A widespread lack of organizational AI competency resources are causing shaky results.

• 29% of marketers said in a March American Marketing Association survey that a lack of AI skills was a barrier to adoption. Nearly one quarter (24%) cited a lack of AI strategy.
• 37% of marketers said the absence of a clear AI strategy was a barrier to adoption in a February 2026 study, while 35% pointed to a lack of training, per Supermetrics.
• Over one-quarter (26.6%) of US marketers said that a major challenge in AI adoption was that teams lacked skills to deploy AI solutions, per a January 2026 Validity survey; 23.2% cited difficulties in measuring outcomes.
• 61% of advertisers have not seen any meaningful results from AI adoption, according to a January FreeWheel survey cited by Comcast.
• This is a persistent problem: A 2025 EMARKETER and Zeta Global study found that only 31.2% of marketers worldwide said their organization was prepared to test AI in pilots; just 29.7% said they were ready to actively use AI in production.

Implications for industry leaders: A lack of formal AI training is limiting marketers’ ability to translate widespread usage into meaningful business results.

Addressing that hurdle means leaders must invest in team education and upskilling. Focused experimentation through small-scale projects targeting clear inefficiencies can help teams build practical expertise, demonstrate value, and gain confidence in using AI.

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