Why successful AI adoption is really about balancing competing business priorities.

For the past two years, the conversation around artificial intelligence has focused almost entirely on the technology. Which models are better? Which AI tools should we use? How quickly is AI evolving?

While those are important questions, they aren't the questions most organizations are struggling to answer.

The real challenge isn't AI itself. It's the competing priorities AI introduces across the business. Senior leaders are pushing to move faster and embed AI into products, services, and business processes. Employees are trying to determine which tools they should use. Legal and Security teams are working to protect the organization. Finance is trying to understand rapidly changing costs and whether AI investments are producing measurable business value.

Parking, $45. Chicken fingers and a beer, $54. Popcorn, $17.99. A slice of pizza, $24. At any other place on Earth, these prices would be outrageous.

The neighborhood pizza shop couldn't charge $24 for a slice. The local restaurant would never get away with a $17.99 bucket of popcorn. Raise prices that aggressively almost anywhere else, and customers would simply walk away.

Yet there I was at the Lionel Richie / Earth Wind & Fire concert, standing in a long line with hundreds of other fans, happily handing over my credit card.

It made me wonder...

My head is still spinning from ATD in May. Everywhere you turned, there was another AI announcement, another product launch, or another promise about how AI was going to transform learning. It was exciting, but also a little overwhelming.

A few months later, the picture is becoming much clearer. Organizations are moving beyond experimenting with AI and beginning to identify where it delivers real value. Rather than asking, "Should we use AI?" the question is becoming, "Where should we use AI first?"

As we head into the second half of 2026, here are five trends I believe will have the biggest impact on talent development.

Over the past few months, we've noticed an interesting trend. More organizations are beginning to shift portions of their learning portfolios back to virtual delivery. Unlike during COVID, this isn't being driven by health concerns. It’s most likely being driven by economics.

Travel costs continue to rise. Airfare, hotels, meals, and meeting expenses have all increased significantly over the past few years. Add in continued global economic uncertainty, and many organizations are tightening travel budgets or asking learning leaders to accomplish more with fewer resources.

I don't believe we're headed back to an all-virtual world. Face-to-face learning still has tremendous value, especially for strategic planning, leadership development, and team building. What I do believe is that organizations will become much more selective about when they bring people together. That creates an opportunity to rethink how virtual learning is designed and delivered.

Every year, organizations invest hundreds of thousands, and often millions of dollars, bringing people together for leadership summits, national sales meetings, annual kickoffs, functional conferences, and customer events. They reserve hotels, book flights, bring in keynote speakers, and spend months planning every detail.

Those meetings are designed to communicate strategy, launch new initiatives, celebrate success, and align the organization around what's next. Those objectives are important, but I believe many companies are overlooking one of the greatest opportunities these events provide.

If you're investing in bringing people together, don't miss the opportunity to develop them while they're there.

Most corporate meetings are built around presentations. Executives share the vision, business leaders provide updates, and subject matter experts introduce new products, initiatives, or processes. While those sessions are necessary, they're often passive experiences for the audience.

Imagine replacing just one presentation with an interactive business simulation.

Instead of listening to someone describe a business challenge, participants experience it. They analyze information, debate alternatives, make decisions as a team, and immediately see the impact of those decisions. The conversation becomes richer because participants have applied the concepts instead of simply hearing about them.