Tighter AI rules can push staff to hide their AI use (opens the source in a new tab)
- Deloitte consultants writing in HBR describe an "AI control trap": leaders answer slow AI adoption with monitoring and mandates, staff respond by hiding their use or routing around rules, and leaders tighten further.
- Their TrustID research finds shadow AI use holding at about 50%, and senior leaders 40% more likely than their staff to say they use it themselves.
- Their fix, drawn from a Salesforce rollout they worked on: reward staff for finding AI flaws, invest in AI training, and let people closest to the work decide, keeping tight controls for sensitive data and big decisions.
- ~50%
- Workers using shadow AI (Deloitte)
- 40%
- How much likelier leaders are to use it
Why it matters If the people best placed to learn what AI can do are hiding it, companies lose exactly the lessons that would make their AI spending pay off.
Other side The authors are Deloitte consultants who helped with the Salesforce rollout they hold up, and Salesforce sells the AI tools involved. Looser rules also mean more mistakes reaching customers, a risk regulated firms may not accept.