Every year, “Guide to Next” is our chance to take a clear-eyed look at what’s coming. But this year, the stakes feel higher—the decisions heavier, the bets bigger. Leaders told us they’re walking into 2026 with equal parts optimism and unease. The phrase that stuck with us was this: optimistic uncertainty.

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That tension is real. Across Publicis Sapient’s own industry surveys, the majority of executives say their AI technology and programs are scaled or enterprise ready. Yet our data, and the experts we spoke with, reveal a different story: most organizations are still in pilot mode.

Confidence is outpacing capability, and that gap has become the new fault line in enterprise AI. It’s what our research calls decision debt: when optimism moves faster than evidence, and assumptions scale before systems do.

Here's where the cracks are starting to show, and the fights in front of every organization in 2026:

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• Originality vs. sameness. If you let off-the-shelf AI dictate your choices, you’ll look and sound like everyone else. Efficiency without distinctiveness is a race to the bottom.
• Breakthrough vs. bottleneck. Put agents to work to shorten delivery cycles, run tests and reimagine design. Then scale with intent, powered by data that’s clean, connected and governed like the asset it is.
• Decisions vs. deferrals. Years of tech debt have piled up: old systems, deferred decisions, fragile fixes. Agentic AI won’t cover those cracks; it will make them impossible to ignore.
• Routine vs. reinvention. Redefine roles. Put humans in the loop for judgment, ethics and context. Build systems that reflect who you are, not just what’s cheapest or easiest.

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“Guide to Next 2026” is both a map and a mirror: a look at where markets are headed and a reflection of how ready leaders truly are. Across every sector we studied, ambition is high, but alignment still lags.

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Winning now means closing that distance. It means turning confidence into capability, not just in what you build, but in how you govern, measure and lead. The bold moves ahead won’t just be technological; they’ll be structural, cultural and human.

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