Employees and executives differ in how they see goals, communication, and AI rollout

Political divides? Tired. Employee/employer divides? Wired.

A new survey from Axios HQ, a non-journalistic offshoot of the publication that sells “AI-powered software” to companies for internal communications, found that alignment on goals between employees and company leaders fell by roughly half compared to last year.

In the 2025 report, 27% of leaders said their employees were “entirely aligned with org goals.” Only 9% of employees agreed. Ouch. Last year those numbers were 44% and 14%, respectively. Double ouch. The survey polled more than 450 US business leaders and 800 white collar workers in January.

Executives and employees were also split on internal communication and, unsurprisingly, AI implementation.

Business leaders seem to have a high opinion of their communication skills. Four in five leaders thought their communication to employees was helpful, relevant, clear, and engaging. However, only about 50% of employees thought so.

Hardly anyone seems to think companies are doing AI implementation well. Only 11% of employees thought the rollout of AI to scale productivity was effective with clear guidelines and benefits, and only 27% of company leaders agreed. Weirdly, the percentage of employees who didn’t think their company was rolling out AI at all was 32%, but only 17% of business leaders confirmed their company wasn’t.

So clearly someone isn’t communicating well about AI implementation.