AT Trevor & Associates’ ThinkTank’26 in Harare, we asked a room of Zimbabwean executives a deceptively simple question: is artificial intelligence already shaping your workplace, or are you still treating it as a future concern?
The answer, drawn from an online survey completed by senior decision-makers across multiple sectors during the event, was unambiguous. AI has arrived. The tools are live. The question is no longer if — it is how well.
And right now, for most Zimbabwean organisations, the honest answer to that question is: not well enough.
Adoption is outpacing readiness
Nearly nine in 10 leaders, who participated in our ThinkTank’26 survey confirmed that their organisations had deployed some form of AI tool within the past 12 months.
These are not experiments confined to innovation labs. Workflow automation, data analytics and customer service applications are already embedded in daily operations across sectors.
Yet only 41% of those same organisations rate their preparedness as good or excellent.
The rest describe their readiness as average or poor.
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This is the defining gap of the moment: organisations are deploying transformative technology faster than they are building the governance, strategy and capability to manage it responsibly. That is not innovation. That is exposure.
The constraint is not technology — it is capability
When our survey asked executives to identify their single greatest barrier to effective AI deployment, the response was striking.
Close to 60% named lack of internal expertise. Infrastructure ranked lower. Regulation ranked lower. Budget, too.
The tools are accessible. The human capability to deploy them intelligently is not.
This is compounded by a training gap that should concern every CEO and board member in the country.
Just over 40% of surveyed organisations have conducted informal AI training in the past year.
Another 40% report that no training has taken place at all.
Meanwhile, staff confidence with AI tools remains low across the majority of organisations.
In plain terms: many Zimbabwean businesses are asking their people to work with powerful, consequential technology they have not been equipped to understand.
Governance is the absent foundation
More than half of the organisations in our survey do not yet have formal policies governing AI use.
A further portion say such policies are still being developed.
This matters enormously. Without governance frameworks, organisations cannot manage data privacy risks, ensure accountability in algorithmic decision-making, or protect themselves from liability when AI-driven processes produce adverse outcomes.
It is worth noting that over 80% of our respondents described cybersecurity as extremely important in AI deployment — yet the same organisations are largely operating without the policies that would give that concern any practical force.
Risk awareness, in other words, has not yet translated to risk management.
The ethical and social dimension cannot be deferred
Zimbabwe’s business leaders are not oblivious to the broader implications of AI.
Questions around data privacy, transparency, job displacement and workforce impact are registering clearly in boardroom conversations.
Over half of respondents say these concerns have already shaped their AI planning.
This is encouraging. But awareness is not the same as action.
The organisations that will navigate AI’s social and ethical dimensions successfully are those that build structured approaches to stakeholder engagement, transparent communication about how these technologies are being used and proactive frameworks for managing workforce transition.
These are not purely technical challenges. They are strategic and communicative ones.
The outlook is optimistic — and the window is open
Despite the readiness gaps, Zimbabwean business leaders remain overwhelmingly optimistic about AI’s trajectory.
Nearly two-thirds expect AI to produce largely positive organisational transformation over the next three years.
That optimism is well-founded.
AI has genuine potential to improve productivity, sharpen decision-making and enhance service delivery across Zimbabwe’s private sector.
But potential is not destiny. The organisations that realise those gains will be the ones that approach AI with deliberate strategy, strong governance and leadership that is capable of guiding both the technology and the people who must use it.
When our ThinkTank’26 participants were asked what capabilities they most urgently needed, AI strategy, leadership development and broader digital literacy consistently appeared at the top.
The message from Zimbabwe’s executive community is clear: the priority is not more tools.
It is the organisational capability to use them wisely.
The cost of drifting
The central finding from ThinkTank’26 is not that AI is coming. It is that AI is already here — and most organisations are navigating it without a map.
In a rapidly shifting technological landscape, passivity is not a neutral position.
It is a competitive and reputational risk.
The organisations that move deliberately — building strategy, governance, workforce capability and ethical frameworks — will not only protect themselves.
They will define the field.
ThinkTank’26 was designed precisely to surface these insights: to give Zimbabwe’s executive community the intelligence, the peer dialogue and the strategic clarity to act.
The survey data you have just read did not come from a distant research institute.
It came from your peers, your competitors and your collaborators — gathered in real time, in Harare.
That is the value of convening with intention.
How Trevor & Associates can help you
The gaps this survey has identified are exactly what Trevor & Associates was built to close.
We work with organisations at the intersection of strategy, technology, communication and governance — precisely the terrain where AI readiness must be built.
Whether your organisation is at the beginning of its AI journey or seeking to strengthen a deployment already underway, our advisory services are designed to meet you where you are.
Specifically, we can help you with:
AI deployment strategy — translating ambition into a structured, phased and Board-aligned AI roadmap
Governance and policy frameworks — developing the internal policies, accountability structures and risk management protocols your organisation needs before the next incident, not after
Digital and AI literacy programmes — equipping your leadership teams and staff with the confidence and competence to work with these tools effectively
Strategic communications — helping you to communicate your AI strategy clearly and credibly to customers, employees, investors and regulators
ESG and ethical AI advisory — ensuring your deployment of AI aligns with your values commitments, stakeholder expectations and emerging global standards
Stakeholder engagement and ethical lobbying — helping you to shape the policy and regulatory environment in which your organisation operates
AI is not a technology problem with a technology solution. It is a leadership challenge that demands strategic, communicative and ethical responses in equal measure.
If you are ready to move from awareness to action, we are ready to work with you
Trevor Ncube is chairman of Alpha Media Holdings. Contact Trevor & Associates: www.trevorandassociates.com
The ThinkTank’26 survey was conducted via an online questionnaire among executives and senior decision-makers attending the Trevor & Associates ThinkTank event in Harare in February 2026.
