Regulatory and economic challenges—plus generative AI’s potential—top the agenda for CEOs in our new survey.
Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
Forget the “chess versus checkers” comparisons: How about trying to play multiple games of chess at once? That’s the dynamic mix of challenges that US chief executive officers (CEOs) are navigating in this age of compound volatility.
Indeed, CEOs continue to face a complex agenda as 2024 reaches the halfway mark: structural economic changes, increased regulatory activity, geopolitical risks, emerging growth opportunities—and those are just a few of the arenas competing for leadership’s attention. Finding the right balance is leaving them little room for error, as we report in our new 2024 KPMG US CEO Outlook Pulse Survey.
Despite the multiple and often competing strategic challenges, most CEOs remain confident in their company’s ability to execute and deliver new growth, as well as in the prospects for the US economy overall. Here’s a closer look at CEOs’ perspectives in a few of the areas covered in our new report.
While the CEOs in our survey were largely confident about growth prospects overall, many indicated they are making strategic adjustments in the short term to manage close-in risks and structural changes to the US economy. Increased regulatory activity was a top concern. For example, three-quarters of respondents cited 2024’s debut of the new global minimum tax regulations (Pillar Two) as a significant burden that will be a drag on operating costs. And uncertainty about evolving guidelines in areas like environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and artificial intelligence (AI) adds further complexity for CEOs in their near-term planning.
AI remains a promising area of growth and opportunity for many of the CEOs in our survey. And CEOs are especially focused on generative AI, with its ability to take foundational AI capabilities in areas like data management and process automation and extend them by generating advanced insights, reports, and financial analyses that match human-level outputs. Many CEOs see generative AI as central to gaining a competitive advantage, and they are working to rapidly advance deployment across their enterprises in a responsible way.
Delivering on sustainability initiatives edged out other areas as CEOs’ top operational priority, followed by inflation-proofing capital and advancing digitization across the organization. But as further evidence of the complex mix of priorities facing CEOs this year, company leaders are also trying to make time for beefing up supply-chain resiliency and enhancing customer experience.
To learn much more about each area above, download our new report, which also includes deep-dives into CEO perspectives on merger and acquisition activity, talent and culture priorities, and more.
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