The Credibility Gap: Why Most Executives Are Mandating AI They've Never Actually Used
Jason Dussault
Chief Executive Officer, Co-Founder
This Post is disseminated on behalf of Intellistake Technologies Corp.
Picture this. You're in a meeting with someone sharp — good track record, respected in their field. They spend twenty minutes walking through how AI is going to transform their business. Roadmaps. Timelines. Competitive moats.
You ask what AI tools they're actually using day to day.
Long pause.
"I've played around with ChatGPT a bit."
I'm not pointing fingers — I've sat in enough of those meetings to know it's not laziness. It's a familiarity gap that's quietly widening between what leaders are committing to publicly and what they're actually doing privately. And it has real consequences.
The Numbers Tell The Story
I've written before about what AI agents actually do and why the shift from chatbots matters
[see previous blog post]. But knowing what the technology does and actually using it are two very different things.
Stanford economist Nicholas Bloom surveyed nearly 6,000 senior executives across the US, UK, Germany, and Australia. The result: 69% of CEOs, CFOs, and senior leaders are using AI for less than an hour a week. Twenty-eight percent don't use it at all.¹
Twenty-eight percent.
These are the same people signing off on AI budgets, announcing AI strategies, and telling their boards this is the defining technology of the decade. The gap between the message and the reality I believe is significant.
This Is Where It Breaks Down
Here's where it gets costly. Gallup found that employees whose managers actively model AI use are more than twice as likely to use the tools themselves and 6.5 times more likely to say those tools are actually useful.²
So when leadership isn't engaging with the technology, the whole organization quietly takes its cue. Adoption stalls. ROI disappoints. And the instinct is to blame the tools or the implementation, when the real signal was coming from the top the whole time.
It's not intentional. But it's consistent.
There's also a practical cost that doesn't show up in the adoption metrics. Leaders who aren't using the tools regularly lose the ability to have informed conversations about them. They can't push back on vendor claims. They can't identify where AI is genuinely saving time versus where it's creating new problems. They end up making strategic decisions about technology they've never actually sat down with and that gap shows up eventually, whether in a boardroom, a budget review, or a conversation with an employee who's been using these tools every day and knows exactly what they can and can't do.
Leading From The Front
According to Fortune, Mark Zuckerberg is building his own AI agent to help him function as CEO.³ The tool is still in development, but the reported idea is straightforward — instead of having to query multiple people across the organization to get information, the agent does that work for him, surfacing what he needs faster and cutting through the layers of process that typically slow executive decisions down.
He's essentially using AI to make himself a more informed, faster-moving leader.
The move is worth paying attention to. He's not just announcing an AI strategy he's building firsthand experience with the tools he's asking his entire organization to embrace. And according to Gallup's data, that kind of visible engagement from leadership is one of the strongest drivers of organization-wide adoption.²
It's also worth noting what this approach signals internally. When employees see their CEO genuinely wrestling with the same tools they're being asked to adopt; not just endorsing them from a distance. It stops being a top-down mandate and starts feeling like a shared direction. That's a harder thing to manufacture than most leaders realize, and it doesn't come from a memo.
Where This Leaves Most Organizations
The executives who are going to navigate this well over the next few years will not necessarily be the most technically sophisticated ones. They will be the ones who are genuinely willing to engage with the tools; to try things, get it wrong occasionally, and build real working knowledge. That kind of hands-on familiarity is hard to fake in a room full of people who are using these tools every day, and it matters more than most leaders realize when it comes to setting the tone for how seriously their teams take AI adoption.
The technology is developing fast enough that secondhand knowledge goes stale quickly. What felt clunky or limited six months ago has often improved significantly. The only way to stay current is to actually be in it — and the credibility that comes from that, the ability to have an honest, informed conversation about what's working and what isn't, is genuinely difficult to manufacture from a distance. That's not a technology problem. It's the kind of leadership problem that's very much within reach to solve.
Disclaimer
There has been significant volatility in digital assets and their value can decline rapidly, which in turn would lead to a decline in the stock price of companies holding digital assets. Intellistake is a start-up that does not have the same access to capital as other larger more established companies.
Intellistake has just commenced operating its business and is at an early stage of development. Intellistake is entering this space by acquiring and operating blockchain validator hardware that supports AI networks and investing in AI-related digital tokens to primarily operate validator hardware.
Intellistake is presently evaluating the regulatory framework for tokenization. Any tokenization will be subject to it being completed in compliance with applicable law, regulatory requirements and terms of any underlying agreements associated with the underlying assets. The actual structure of such tokenization, the assets that would be subject to tokenization, and the associated timeline, have not yet been determined. Intellistake will provide further updates as material developments related to this tokenization strategy occur.
Intellistake is developing custom AI software systems called "AI Agents" for businesses. It recently announced the development of IntelliScope, a newly designed enterprise artificial-intelligence (AI) suite that applies decentralized AI technologies to deliver transparent and verifiable corporate intelligence. IntelliScope, which is in testing, is being publicly introduced as Intellistake's enterprise AI suite, reflecting the Company's focus on advancing practical applications of decentralized AI technologies.
The IntelliScope suite is being developed as a collection of modular AI agents, each intended to address specific enterprise challenges. Development has advanced through internal closed testing, where functionality is being refined and validated. Built to leverage decentralized AI technologies developed within the ASI Alliance FET token ecosystem, IntelliScope is now preparing to move into closed beta testing with an enterprise client, a phase focused on gathering feedback to shape premium features and expand real-world use cases.
The Company intends to deliver these solutions either as one-time projects or ongoing subscription services. Revenue is expected to come from implementation fees and monthly subscription payments. The Company does not presently have any customers. Intellistake is just commencing operations. It is targeting significant growth but its business is subject to several risks related to general business, economic and social uncertainties; the sufficiency of cash to meet liquidity needs; legislative, political and competitive developments; the inherent risks involved in the digital currency and general securities markets; the volatility of digital currency prices and the additional risks identified in the "Risk Factors" section of the Company’s filings with applicable securities regulators. Intellistake has not yet developed or commercialized its AI solutions.
Completion of the Singularity Venture Hub (“SVH”) acquisition remains subject to completion of satisfactory due diligence, the negotiation, and execution of a definitive agreement ("Definitive Agreement") that will include representations, warranties, covenants, indemnities, termination rights, and other provisions customary for a transaction of this nature, no objection from the Canadian Securities Exchange, and shareholder approval of SVH, if required.
This report contains "forward-looking information" concerning anticipated developments and events related to the Company that may occur in the future. Forward looking information contained in this report includes, but is not limited to, all statements in respect of the Company's growth and development, the operations and business segments of the Company, support for decentralized AI and blockchain networks, the details of the collaboration with Orbit AI and its expected benefits; the Company’s contributions towards the collaboration with Orbit AI; the timelines for Orbit AI’s operation; and Intellistake’s strategy to support tokenized, decentralized AI infrastructure.
In certain cases, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of words such as "expects", "intends", "anticipates" or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "would", or "might" suggesting future outcomes, or other expectations, assumptions, intentions or statements about future events or performance. Forward-looking information contained in this report is based on certain assumptions regarding, among other things, the Company and SVH satisfy all conditions necessary to close the proposed transaction; the Company will continue to have access to financing until it achieves profitability; obtaining the necessary regulatory approvals; the technology and blockchain industries in which the Company intends to focus its business in will grow at the rate and in the manner expected; the ability to attract qualified personnel; the success of market initiatives and the ability to grow brand awareness; the ability to distribute Company's services; the Company creates strategies to mitigate risks associated with cryptocurrency price fluctuations; the Company and SVH remain compliant with all applicable laws and securities regulations and applicable licensing requirements; the Company engages and collaborates with local experts, as necessary, to address jurisdiction-specific matters and ensures compliance with foreign regulations to avoid penalties; the Company addresses any potential cybersecurity threats promptly and effectively; the ability of the Company to develop its technology, acquire customers and have revenue; the ability to successfully deploy the new business strategy as a result of the change of business. While the Company considers these assumptions to be reasonable, they may be incorrect.
Forward looking information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results to be materially different from any future results expressed by the forward-looking information. Such factors include risks related to general business, economic and social uncertainties; failure of the Company and SVH to satisfy all conditions necessary to close the proposed transaction; failure to raise the capital necessary to fund its operations; inability to create strategies to mitigate the risks associated with cryptocurrency price fluctuations; the costs of regulation in the digital asset industries increase to the extent that the Company is no longer generating sufficient returns for shareholders; failure to promptly and effectively address cybersecurity threats; insufficient resources to maintain its operations on a competitive basis; and the actual costs, timing and future plans differs expectations; legislative, environmental and other judicial, regulatory, political and competitive developments; the inherent risks involved in the cryptocurrency and general securities markets; the Company may not be able to profitably liquidate its current digital currency inventory, or at all; a decline in digital currency prices may have a significant negative impact on the Company's operations; the Company's success may depend on the continued involvement of key personnel, including advisors, whose involvement cannot be guaranteed; institutional adoption of decentralized AI infrastructure remains uncertain and may not occur at the pace or scale anticipated; evolving regulatory frameworks, including those related to AI (such as Canada's proposed Artificial Intelligence and Data Act), may impose additional compliance burdens or restrict certain business activities; valuation figures are based on publicly available market data and internal assessments at the time of the referenced transactions and may not reflect current or future valuations; the volatility of digital currency prices; the inherent uncertainty of cost estimates and the potential for unexpected costs and expenses, currency fluctuations; regulatory restrictions, liability, competition, loss of key employees and other related risks and uncertainties; delay or failure to receive regulatory approvals; failure to attract qualified personnel, labour disputes; and the additional risks identified in the "Risk Factors" section of the Company's filings with applicable Canadian securities regulators.
Although the Company has attempted to identify factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking information, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated. Readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. The forward-looking information is made as of the date of this report. Except as required by applicable securities laws, the Company does not undertake any obligation to publicly update forward-looking information.
