The New Operating Model for Analytics Report shows an increasing focus on AI training and change management programs, as leaders scale trusted AI and agentic analytics
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., March 10, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- ThoughtSpot, the Agentic Analytics Platform company, today released "The New Operating Model for Analytics," a global study of 1,200 data and business leaders revealing that the real measure of maturity isn't just AI adoption; it's how quickly and confidently they can deliver trusted answers at scale and turn those answers into decisive action.
As 74% of businesses race toward full GenAI maturity within three years, the report uncovers a stark "Legacy Latency Crisis." While the average company still waits a long time for insights, "Leading" organizations - those which have already operationalized Gen AI and Agentic AI use cases across broader business functions - have broken the cycle, with 53% of their workforce accessing trusted answers instantaneously.
AI Maturity is a Flywheel
The report proves that AI maturity creates a self-funding flywheel. High-performing organizations aren't just experimenting, they are delivering immediate value by placing trustworthy insights at the heart of their architecture. These trusted insights are in turn driving higher organizational adoption, resulting in more measurable outcomes. With these success metrics fuelling increased investment in future projects:
- The Investment Surge: 93% of AI Leaders plan to increase budgets in 2026, compared to 60% of those still in the experimentation phase. Overall, one in ten (11%) companies plan to increase their funding of AI projects by over 50% this year, while a further one third (34%) plan to increase their AI budgets by at least 10%.
- Trust Leads to Adoption: Amongst surveyed AI leaders, 95% reported being very confident in the insights delivered via their analytics and intelligence platforms. This compares to only 45% of businesses in the experimental phase, highlighting the critical role trust plays in turning projects widely operational.
- The Cost of Delay: Nearly 40% of businesses are still stuck waiting over 24 hours for single insights, with one quarter (24%) forced to wait upwards of a week. In an era of instantaneous decision making, this bottleneck is becoming a primary threat to market relevance.
"The data confirms a widening performance gap between those companies still with AI prototypes and those who have moved to production," said Cindi Howson, Chief Data & AI Strategy Officer at ThoughtSpot. "Moving from a prototype to production stage is less about technical maturity and more about organizational readiness. Key steps such as aligning to business value or ensuring AI literacy company wide are often forgotten as companies rush to implement AI-anything. What this report shows is the critical role that alignment to business strategy and people change management play in achieving AI maturity."
The Operating Model Revolution
The transition to "Agentic Analytics"-where AI agents alert, explain, and take action-is fundamentally altering the corporate structure:
- Building vs. Buying: Only 9% of mature organizations attempt to build agentic AI entirely in-house, preferring to partner for best-of-breed architecture to scale faster.
- The Talent Shift: 82% of leaders recognize that upskilling and reskilling employees is the most critical impact of the agentic era. Leading organizations are showing a willingness to invest in this upskilling. Half of all organizations are already providing leadership training to ensure the smooth rollout of AI projects, while 34% have also implemented a full change management strategy to ensure all employees are informed, knowledgeable and set up to succeed in the AI age.
- Long Term Planning: To best set the base for long term success, organizations are largely split between implementing centralized AI management (38%) and a hybrid, federated approach (38%). To date, only 16% are pursuing more decentralized AI strategies.
To download a copy of the full report and to see the wider trends driving decision making across businesses, please visit here.
About The New Operating Model for Analytics report
The report surveyed over 1200 data and business leaders on their current and future plans regarding Gen AI and Agentic AI projects. Research was conducted by Sapio Research, a Certified B Corp research agency that helps businesses grow thanks to high quality, efficient and honest research solutions.
About ThoughtSpot
ThoughtSpot is the Agentic Analytics Platform that empowers every enterprise to transform insights into action. Our mission is to create a more fact-driven world by delivering a platform where anyone can effortlessly explore any data, ask any question, and uncover actionable insights faster-leading to growth, better business outcomes, and efficiency in their organizations. The platform's unified capabilities are amplified by a comprehensive suite of specialized Spotter agents that automate every stage of the analytics workflow, empowering analysts, data engineers, developers and business users to deliver real-time actionable insights that drive growth. By combining agentic AI with ThoughtSpot's intuitive natural language search, businesses empower every user to confidently discover proactive insights from their data, creating real-time decisioning with impact. Accessible via the web and mobile app, ThoughtSpot ensures intelligent decision-making happens seamlessly, wherever and whenever needed. For organizations looking to drive value, ThoughtSpot Embedded provides a low-code solution to integrate AI-powered analytics directly into products and services that make every application an intelligent experience, driving data monetization and boosting user engagement for customers. Industry leaders like Lyft, Unilever, Roche, Schneider Electric, Huel and HubSpot rely on ThoughtSpot to transform how their employees and customers take advantage of data to create better business outcomes. Try ThoughtSpot today and experience the new era of analytics.
Tim Scarfe
timothy.scarfe@thoughtspot.com
510 399 9032
