2026.13: Myth 3 - Profitable Companies Are Best Positioned for AI
The reality, comfort is the enemy of adaptation.
Happy Thursday, from Calgary. Colder here and so much snow. Maybe I should have stayed in “The Six”?!
We are pushing this out a day early, in anticipation of the long weekend. No matter what you are celebrating, I hope it is full of love and joy with friends and family.
This is Part 3 of the Five Myths About AI Transformation series. First we hit Myth 1 - You Don’t Need an AI Strategy, fixing the foundation before chasing AI. Last week, Myth 2 - AI Is the Technology That Changes Everything was about why boring technology outperforms the shiny stuff. This week is different. This one is about YOU!
Let’s break it down.
The Signal:
Forrester Named Your Disengaged Employees. They Call Them “Coasters.”
Forrester’s Predictions 2026: The Future of Work report introduced a category that should make every profitable company uncomfortable. “Coasters.” Disengaged workers who don’t think their employer deserves their energy. Not quitting. Not sabotaging. Just doing the minimum.
This group hit 27% in 2024, dipped to 25% in 2025, and Forrester expects it to climb to 28% in 2026.
The why isn’t complicated. Employees watched colleagues get laid off for AI that never materialized. 55% of employers who made those cuts already regret it. Entry-level positions are disappearing, locking out the generation with the highest AI readiness (Gen Z at 22%, Baby Boomers at 6%). And companies that could afford to invest in training mostly didn’t. Only 23% of AI decision-makers said their organizations offered prompt engineering training in 2025.
Meanwhile, investors are paying attention. Mercer’s Global Talent Trends 2026 found that 97% of investors said funding decisions would be negatively impacted by companies that fail to upskill workers on AI. 77% favor companies building their workforce alongside the technology.
The profitable companies have the resources. Most aren’t using them. And both the talent market and the investment market are starting to keep score.
The Scale:
Myth 3: Profitable Companies Are Best Positioned for AI
Reality: Comfort is the enemy of adaptation.
Both types of companies come to me. The ones in pain and the ones riding high. The ones in pain are afraid it will get worse. The ones riding high have the opposite problem. They’re afraid change will work, and they’ll have to rethink how they do business.
Both end up in the same place: avoidance.
Stephen Andriole made this point in 2017. Profitable companies are the least likely to transform successfully because they have the least incentive to change. How many successful companies, without market pressure, have truly rethought their business models? Very few.
Clayton Christensen spent decades explaining why. Incumbents don’t fail because they’re blind. They fail because their business environment doesn’t allow them to pursue new approaches when those approaches aren’t profitable enough at first. Everything in the structure is optimized to protect what’s currently working. The focus on existing customers becomes locked into internal processes. Even senior managers can’t shift investment away from what’s paying the bills.
Vijay Govindarajan (VG) built a framework that names this imbalance. His Three Box Solution says companies need to manage the present (Box 1), selectively forget the past (Box 2), and create the future (Box 3). Profitable companies pour everything into Box 1. Box 2, the forgetting, gets skipped because the past is still working. And Box 3 gets lip service. VG’s sharpest insight: what you need to forget is a future weakness, but it’s embedded in your current strength. That’s why it’s so hard to let go.
Donella Meadows called these balancing feedback loops. Forces that resist change because the current state produces acceptable results. The company is profitable. The shareholders are happy. The system whispers: don’t rock the boat.
But “well enough” is a moving target. McKinsey found that organizations adopting a digitally ready setup can quadruple their 5-year revenue growth and nearly triple total return to shareholders. PwC’s analysis of close to a billion job postings found that AI-exposed industries see 3x higher revenue-per-employee growth. Wages in AI-exposed roles carry a 56% premium, up from 25% a year earlier.
Those numbers don’t describe companies replacing workers with AI. They describe companies investing in their people alongside AI. The market is pricing in scarcity of humans who know how to work with technology.
Sangeet Paul Choudary calls the resistance “architectural self-preservation.” Units of work define roles, expertise, and status. Changing them redistributes influence. Leaders sense resistance and call it culture. Choudary says it’s the system protecting itself. That protection is strongest when profits are good.
If you’re profitable today, that’s a position of strength. Not a destination. Use it to fund the foundation, train your people, and build the muscle for adaptation while you still have the resources.
Because by the time the market forces your hand, the cost of catching up will be 10x what staying current would have cost.
The best time to fix the roof is when the sun is shining.
The Deep Dive:
This week’s deep dive goes all the way in on Myth 3, including VG’s Three Box Solution applied to the AI adoption challenge, the 2 traps profitable companies fall into, and the 5 specific moves to make while you still have the resources. Read: Your Profitability is Making You Worse at This.