Corporate AI Push Leaves Workers and Creators Weighing Control

A survey of 760 U.S. creative professionals found that 81% had released content made with AI assistance, while 62% were very or extremely concerned about relying too heavily on AI at the expense of human creativity. Companies are bringing these tools in, but the people doing the creative work are still weighing who gets to direct them.

Who Sets the Terms

Luma released its inaugural “State of Creative Professionals and AI: 2026” report at Brandweek. Respondents worked across agencies, brands, production companies and freelance creative work. While 71% said AI creates more benefits than drawbacks for productivity and 40% said it improves both efficiency and creative quality, adoption hasn't settled the question of control. More than half said their organizations lacked a formal process for evaluating and approving AI tools.

Organizations evaluated an average of 6.1 AI tools, adopted 4.3 and discontinued 2.9 over the past year. Seventy-two percent rated their access to AI tools as good or excellent, although training and workflow integration lagged. The difference matters: access to a tool isn't the same as having a say in how a workplace uses it.

Among respondents categorized as “AI Leaders,” 78% had released video projects in which AI generated most or all of the content, compared with 11% of “AI Laggards.” The report said leaders weren't necessarily succeeding by using more tools; rather, they integrated AI more deeply while retaining human oversight and creative direction. That leaves a familiar workplace question hanging over the shiny software: who keeps the authority to make the call?

Agencies and brands already see different stakes. Fifty-five percent of agency respondents expected AI to justify higher fees because of increased creative output and capabilities. Meanwhile, 53% of brand-side respondents expected their organizations to reduce agency spending as internal AI tools made more work possible in-house. One part of the business can sell the same technology as added value, while another uses it as a reason to cut spending.

“The question for creative teams is no longer whether to use AI. It's where AI creates value and where human judgment should stay firmly in control,” said Caroline Ingeborn, COO of Luma. She added: “Creativity, taste, storytelling and judgment remain fundamentally human.”

Efficiency, Measured From the Top

A paid program produced by Withum at the Orange County Executive Forum panel “The Leadership Imperative: A New Playbook for Leading Through Change” urged businesses to define a problem before buying technology. It said adoption alone doesn't measure success; organizations should establish how time savings, cost reductions or added capacity will translate into measurable value. The program recommended reliable data sources, governance guidelines and leadership alignment before scaling AI, and warned that pilot results based on test data may not reflect real operating conditions.

At a separate Orange County panel, Eric Gallagher, identified as Partner at Withum, put it this way: “Instead of asking yourself which AI tool should we be investing in, perhaps the better question to ask is: ‘What business problems are we trying to solve here?’” Colin Fraser, identified as Shareholder at Greenberg Traurig, warned that AI can amplify talent or become “a substitute for thinking.” He said employees should take part in decisions about organizational change and urged leaders: “Be transparent about what you don't know and what you do know.”

The panel also surfaced the power concentrated in business structures themselves. Gallagher said a company may have outgrown its structure when one individual still holds decision-making power. Fraser said “the hierarchical structure of your organization” may need rethinking, while warning that outdated contracts can create intellectual-property, liability and data-security risks. His proposed remedy was periodic review of those contracts—not a change in who owns the business or sets its rules.

The Business of Keeping People Paying

Consumer companies are shifting from monthly boxes toward memberships, automatic replenishment, VIP communities, loyalty benefits, personalized recommendations and members-only product releases. Technology, including AI, can use purchasing history and behavior to adjust delivery schedules, recommend products and identify cancellation signals. When a cancellation warning appears, a business may offer a discount, a different schedule, a recommendation or an option to pause. Mastercard found 34% of consumers said they would stay subscribed if they could pause rather than cancel.

The revenue incentives are explicit. Mastercard data showed 44% of U.S. consumers spent more on subscriptions in 2025, averaging $1,887 annually, compared with $1,416 the previous year. Shopify estimates average customer lifetime value at $300 to $550-plus for health and wellness and about $185 for beauty and personal care. Recurly's 2026 analysis of 76 million subscribers across 2,200 merchants found nearly one-quarter of new sign-ups came from former subscribers. The article also noted that consumers had accumulated recurring charges and experienced “subscription fatigue.” Companies use data and retention offers to keep revenue flowing; a customer's ability to pause can become another lever in the retention system.

Workers also constrain corporate growth. Aerospace companies including SpaceX, Rocket Lab, Relativity Space and Anduril are expanding across Southern California, while employers seek engineers, machinists, welders, manufacturing technicians, software developers and AI specialists. A 2026 Deloitte analysis described workforce limits as pressure on companies' ability to turn demand into production and revenue. Deloitte also reported engineering and skilled manufacturing positions remained among the hardest to fill. Proposed responses include internships, apprenticeships, university partnerships and community-college programs; approximately 59,500 apprentices in advanced manufacturing occupations were counted by fiscal 2023.

The music business shows another version of the scramble to organize attention and revenue. Global recorded music revenue reached $31.7 billion in 2025, with streaming generating nearly 70% of it. A TikTok/Luminate study found 84% of songs entering the Billboard Global 200 during 2024 had gone viral on TikTok first. Companies can draw money from streaming, touring, merchandise, publishing, licensing, sponsorships, memberships and synchronization deals. The route to an audience has changed; the push to turn that audience into revenue hasn't.

The sources describe no grassroots, self-organized response to these business strategies. They describe firms adapting tools, contracts, staffing and customer relationships to protect measurable returns. In the boardroom, the question is which technology to deploy. For workers, artists and customers, the sharper question is who gets to decide what the technology is for—and who pays when the decision serves the business first.