Across industries—from life sciences to banking to travel—leaders are moving past tech proofs of concept and focusing on proof of return. At McKinsey’s Global Technology Analyst Summit, firm leaders and clients spoke about how we’re partnering to capture the full value of AI and other emerging technologies.
1. Technology is everywhere—turning it to returns is key
Despite the explosion of new tools, most organizations have yet to see clear financial returns from AI. “You see AI everywhere except on the bottom line,” said Asutosh Padhi, a senior partner and McKinsey’s global leader of innovation and strategy. “The companies that will win the next decade aren’t the ones chasing the newest tools—they’re the ones turning innovation into sustained impact.”
To do that, organizations must focus on “the how,” explained Kelsey Robinson, a senior partner who leads McKinsey’s Growth, Marketing & Sales Practice in North America. “The most successful transformations start with ‘the how’—how to build, change-manage, and govern for impact,” including the need to build internal capabilities necessary for long-term success.
2. Strategic partnerships power real-world change
The event underscored that alliances are becoming essential to delivering impact at scale. McKinsey partners with tech leaders through our ecosystem of alliances and acquisitions, from hyperscalers to enterprise software companies, where the emphasis is on joint client service. “Everyone has alliances,” said Alex Panas, a senior partner and global leader of industries for McKinsey. “What matters is what you do with them.”
That philosophy came to life in a recent effort with a leading industrial manufacturer, where McKinsey and our AI arm, QuantumBlack, collaborated with ecosystem partners to deliver a next-generation sales system. The solution automated lead generation, deployed agentic AI for sales support, and integrated predictive analytics—allowing sales reps to access tailored customer insights in seconds rather than hours. “We show up together, serve clients together, and get results together,” said Brian Elliott, a McKinsey senior partner. “That’s what partnership means.”
3. Technology is the enabler—not the destination
One healthcare client shared how their organization reimagined a complex administrative business that manages billions in hospital transactions each year. Working side by side with McKinsey and QuantumBlack, our client built an agentic system that improved case-resolution time from hours to minutes. As Alex noted, “You actually have to change how people work. Technology is the enabler, not the destination. AI only delivers when people, processes, and leadership evolve together.”
That evolution is happening across industries. In manufacturing, procurement, and supply chain, for example, leaders are using technology to simplify what was once too complex to tackle—from analyzing low-value parts to freeing up teams to focus on strategy and resilience. In R&D, AI models are helping engineers explore design options, producing products in less time.
Ruth Heuss, senior partner and global co-leader of McKinsey’s Operations Practice, put it this way: “New technologies allow us to take on challenges we couldn’t address before. They free people to focus on creating value instead of managing bureaucracy. The companies that win are the ones that combine technology with the organizational change needed to unlock its full potential.”
The lesson is clear: technology doesn’t replace human judgment; it amplifies it. When organizations redesign processes, clarify decision rights, and empower teams to use new tools effectively, technology becomes a true accelerator of performance—not the destination, but the enabler of transformation.