If you lead brand content production or run an in-house agency, answer these three questions.
- Who in your organization owns AI governance for creative production, by name, not by committee
- Has your team been trained on the skills needed for AI transformation, or is adoption happening through trial and error?
- Do you have a clear line between work that must stay human-led, and work where automation should start first?
The 2026 Industry Voices report provides clear insights on how leaders are responding to AI in creative production, what still needs tight human control, and what you should prioritize first to increase output without sacrificing quality.
Two data points from the report should stop you in your tracks.
- Fewer than 30% of organizations say they have the internal expertise to evaluate or govern AI effectively.
- Only 36% of employees say they have been trained on the skills needed for AI transformation.
If you sit on the brand side, those numbers translate into real exposure. You will see inconsistency, approval delays, and teams using AI in ways you cannot explain to Legal, Procurement, or senior leadership.
If you run an in-house agency, those numbers translate into a different kind of problem. Stakeholders will assume speed is now automatic, while your team still carries the work of governance, training, and quality checks.
This is why the report is useful. It does not focus on tools. It focuses on operating decisions.
What Is The 2026 Industry Voices Report
The 2026 Industry Voices report captures how senior leaders are responding to AI inside creative production. It covers what is changing across strategy, operating models, automation, and talent and skills, with direct quotes and examples from leaders who run production at scale.
You will get two things that most AI content does not give you.
First, you will see where readiness is weak, with clear numbers that you can use in internal conversations.
Second, you will see how leaders are building practical ownership, workflows, and team capability so AI use does not turn into risk, rework, and slow approvals.
Contributors include:
- Louise Barrie, Warner Bros. Discovery
- Katie Rosen, Gousto
- Kerry Matto, Just Eat Takeaway.com
- Christi Simoneaux, Oldcastle APG
- Laura Forcetti, WFA
- Todd Dunham, Prologis
- Amy Spears, Tonic at Highmark Health
- George Friedman, Tonic at Highmark Health
The AI Reality Check: Readiness Is The Issue, Not Tool Access
Most teams do not struggle because they lack AI tools. They struggle because they do not have the conditions to use them safely and consistently.
The report makes that gap measurable.
- Fewer than 30% of organizations say they have the internal expertise to evaluate or govern AI effectively.
- Only 36% of employees say they have been trained on the skills needed for AI transformation.
If you want one message to take into your next leadership conversation, use this.
AI will increase output. It will also increase risk and inconsistency if you do not define governance and train your team.
Ask yourself one direct question.
If your CEO asked you today, “How do we control AI use in creative production,” could you answer in two minutes, with clarity, and with ownership assigned?
If the answer is no, you have a readiness problem. You should fix it before you increase AI use.
What Leaders Are Changing First: Ownership Across Functions
AI in production touches more than production. It touches brand risk, legal review, procurement choices, customer trust, and data management. If you keep ownership inside one function, adoption will slow down, or it will spread without control.
This is why leaders are moving toward cross-department AI councils. These groups connect Marketing, IT, Legal, and Operations so AI use stays safe, accountable, and consistent.
If you lead a brand or an in-house agency, do not treat this as a big governance project. Treat it as a practical operating decision.
Here is a short checklist you can implement.
- Name an owner for approved AI use cases in creative production – This person owns the list of where AI may be used, and where it may not be used.
- Name an owner for review rules – This person defines what checks must happen before publication, and who signs off.
- Name an owner for training – This person ensures your team knows how to use AI within your rules, and how to write briefs and prompts that produce usable output.
- Name an owner for reporting – This person tracks what changes when AI enters the workflow, cycle time, revision rounds, and rework.
If you cannot name owners, you will not control outcomes. You will get fragmented usage, uneven quality, and slower approvals.
The New Production Team: Roles Are Changing Right Now
The report points to a clear shift in what production teams need. You will see specialized roles that did not exist a few years ago, including:
- AI Operators
- Creative Technologists
- Prompt Engineers
If you are a brand leader, do not read this as a hiring list. Read it as a responsibility list.
These responsibilities already exist in your organization. Someone already does them, even if it is informal.
Ask yourself this question.
Who owns these responsibilities in your team today, and do they have time and training to do it well?
Here is a practical way to define the roles so you can assign ownership.
AI Operators
They run AI-assisted production tasks, follow rules for approved use cases, and keep outputs consistent. They do not guess what is allowed.
Creative Technologists
They connect tools, templates, and workflows so teams can produce faster without breaking brand standards or review steps.
Prompt Engineers
They improve input quality, build prompt libraries tied to strong briefs, and help teams get consistent results.
If you are an in-house agency leader, this section matters for another reason. Stakeholders will assume AI removes production effort. These roles show the opposite. AI introduces new work that someone must own.
What Leaders Are Saying, In Their Own Words
The strongest part of the report is how direct the leaders are. They do not talk about AI as a trend. They talk about it as a production reality, with clear limits and clear upside.
Louise Barrie, Senior Director, Production and Operations at Warner Bros. Discovery, states:
“AI will have an impact, ideally positive, by boosting creative output, production efficiencies, audience data, enabling personalisation, and expanding brand reach but it cannot replace creativity; it can only support it.”
If you lead a brand, this gives you language to reset expectations. You can support AI adoption while protecting creative quality.
It also gives you a decision rule you can apply: Use AI to support repeatable work, and keep human judgment for creative direction, brand safety, and sensitive topics.
Kerry Matto, Principal, Studio Operations at Just Eat Takeaway.com, puts the production reality on the table:
On average we have around 2000 briefs a year. We intake, we resource, we plan and assign to the studio, we manage stakeholders, we look at tooling and processes as well as new technologies.
If you manage high volume, this quote should feel familiar. It also points to what AI conversations often miss. Your constraints are not only creative. Your constraints include intake discipline, resourcing, stakeholder control, tooling, and process.
Kerry also gives a clear view of why simplicity matters when volume is high:
“When you’re moving as quickly as we do, dealing with, on average, 172 briefs a month you need systems that are simple to use where data can be easily uploaded, through both manual intervention, but also automation and integration.”
If your systems create friction, your team will create workarounds. Your data will get messy. Your approvals will slow down. Your AI output will be inconsistent because inputs are inconsistent.
If you want a clearer view of what leaders are doing next, download the 2026 Industry Voices report.
You will get:
- Direct leader interviews from global brands and in-house teams
- Key data points on governance and training readiness
- Practical direction on ownership, operating decisions, and the roles and skills now entering production teams
