Improv Launches Industry Research Initiative to Benchmark AI Adoption in HR, HCM, and Workforce Management

Improvizations, LLC (Improv), a strategic advisory, implementation, and managed support firm for Human Capital Management and Workforce Management initiatives based in Austin, Texas, has launched The State of AI in HCM and WFM, an anonymous benchmark survey open to HR, HCM, and WFM professionals across industries, company sizes, and platforms.  

The research initiative is designed to close a gap Improv identified in the market: no credible, publicly available benchmark exists that shows where organizations actually are on AI adoption in HR and workforce management, broken out by platform, industry, and company size. 

The survey covers 16 questions and takes approximately three minutes to complete. The survey will address:  

• Current AI usage status and implementation ownership 
• AI governance policy and strategy ownership 
• Outlook and sentiment including barriers and ROI measurement 
• Most high-value starting points 

All responses are fully anonymous and reported only in aggregate.  

The research addresses four specific questions that HR professionals, HCM and WFM practitioners, and operations leaders will benefit from:  

• For which use cases are teams running AI in production versus still piloting? 
• Where does adoption differ meaningfully by platform across UKG, Workday, ADP, and SAP? 
• What is actually slowing teams down between budget constraints, skills gaps, and trust? 
• Is governance policy keeping pace with adoption on the ground? 

The survey results will produce six outputs designed to help leaders leverage AI to optimize value for their companies, including:  

1. A real baseline on AI adoption in HCM and WFM segmented by size, industry, and platform 
2. Platform level data showing user perception on AI readiness across the leading HCM and WFM solutions 
3. Identification of the dominant barrier slowing adoption 
4. A quantified picture of how far governance policy is trailing actual deployment 
5. A ranked list of the problems practitioners most want AI to solve, drawn from open-ended responses 
6. A shared industry report available to every organization that participates 

Respondents who provide a business email receive the finished benchmark report before it goes public. 

The initiative reflects Improv's position as a technology-independent HCM and WFM advisory firm operating across multiple platforms and industries. Because Improv's work spans UKG, Workday, ADP, and other platforms across healthcare, manufacturing, retail, public sector, and service and distribution, the firm is positioned to design research that cuts across the platform boundaries that typically limit industry benchmarking. 

"AI is moving through HR, HCM, and WFM faster than almost any other part of the business. Some organizations are already capturing real advantage from it. Others are still deciding where to start. The honest answer is that nobody has published a clear picture of where the market actually stands, broken out by company size, industry, and platform. That is the gap this research closes," said Vince Jackson, President of Improv. 

HR professionals, HCM and WFM practitioners, and operations leaders can take the survey and request the benchmark report at the Improv AI in HR Survey page. The survey takes three minutes to complete and all responses are anonymous.