The 2025 State of Marketing AI Report is full of interesting data, but one thing jumps out: most companies aren’t building the foundation needed for sustained competitive advantage from AI. They’re dabbling—getting marginal gains at best—because they haven’t put the pieces in place to execute at scale.

Here’s what the survey says:

• 62% of companies offer no AI training

• 75% don’t have a roadmap

• 67% lack an AI council

• 63% don’t have a generative AI policy

This isn’t just an operations gap—it’s a leadership failure. You can’t scale what your teams don’t understand. You can’t expect understanding without training. And none of that happens without clear ownership at the top.

Trying to execute without a foundation is what creates fragmented pilots, siloed tools, and unclear ROI. The tech might be new, but the problem isn’t. We’ve seen this same pattern with digital transformation, e-commerce, and data initiatives. Everyone wants the outcome; few are willing to build the capability.

Here’s the fix: build the foundation, then execute. Or—if you’re under pressure—do both in parallel with structured feedback loops. Either way, no shortcuts. The foundation matters if you want to move past experiments and into impact.

AI isn’t going to deliver strategic advantage to companies that treat it like a side project. It’ll reward the ones willing to make it core to how they operate. That starts with leadership, clarity, and investment in capability—not just tools.