Data literacy is becoming a baseline business capability rather than a specialist skill, according to Carruthers and Jackson, which says companies risk undermining their AI investment if workforce capability does not catch up with the pace of adoption.
The data consultancy’s latest Data Maturity Index, an annual survey of senior data leaders, found that AI is now being used by a high number of employees across organisations or within specific departments in 40% of cases, up from 21% in 2024. Yet capability is lagging. Some 58% of respondents said most employees in their organisation are not data literate, while a further 3% said almost no employees are data literate.
That gap matters because AI tools are no longer confined to technical teams. From HR and finance to marketing and operations, employees are increasingly being asked to interpret data outputs, challenge automated recommendations, and make decisions shaped by AI-driven insights. Carruthers and Jackson argues that those expectations are now extending faster than many employers’ training efforts, leaving organisations exposed to weak decision-making even as spending on platforms, infrastructure, and tooling continues to rise.
Caroline Carruthers, co-founder and chief executive of Carruthers and Jackson, said: “Artificial intelligence is now embedded in everyday workflows, and data literacy can no longer be confined to technical specialists. It is becoming a core business capability that is every bit as fundamental as financial literacy or digital skills.”
She added: “All the AI investment in the world will count for little if our people cannot question outputs, challenge assumptions or translate insight into action. If an organisation, or a country, fails to act now in improving data literacy they will fall behind and the highest-value, data-enabled roles will simply be outsourced elsewhere.”
The consultancy also argues that responsibility for fixing the problem remains fragmented. Unlike financial literacy, which has been supported by a mix of school-based education and sustained industry engagement, there is no single commercial player in data and AI with the same incentive to champion broad capability beyond product-specific training. Carruthers and Jackson says the burden will need to be shared between employers, education providers, and governments if data literacy is to scale quickly enough.
That places the issue firmly in the strategic category rather than the technical one. Carruthers described the current moment as the “second coming” of data, with board-level discussions shifting away from compliance and towards purpose, direction, and business value. In practice, that means organisations are not only asking what data they hold, but how confidently their people can interpret and apply it in real decisions.
As AI becomes more embedded in day-to-day work, the consultancy’s warning is that transformation will depend as much on workforce judgement as on software capability. Businesses may be accelerating adoption, but without stronger data literacy, the distance between having AI tools and using them well is likely to remain stubbornly wide.
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