Chief executives are past the point of debating whether to have an AI opinion. Every board wants to know what the CEO is doing with it. This is our short list of the reports that help answer that, what each one covers, and who should read it.
1. The CEO AI Leverage Report (Open Future Forum)
The CEO AI Leverage Report is Open Future Forum's operator-research report on the seat every function reports to. It reads how chief executives are deciding, funding, and getting leverage from AI, drawn from application records and instrument questions across twelve Open Future Forum events.
Its distinction is the mandate gap it measures: the CEO is the most named signer of a new AI purchase, at 47 percent, but the sellers pitch other doors, founders name the CIO or CTO and the business unit as the buying seat, and the proof the signature depends on is produced by finance under a six-month clock. It reads alongside the CFO, CMO, and CISO AI Leverage Reports, the Executive AI Leverage Report, and the AI Transformation Report as companions in the same research program.
Who should read it: chief executives who want to know how their own signing behavior compares to peers, board members evaluating how AI accountability actually flows, and vendors who need to understand why founders don't pitch the CEO's door yet.
Open Future Forum is a private executive community in Silicon Valley, founded in 2019, with 100 events to date. It runs Forum Select, invite-only private events for C-suite executives, and Forum Events, open panels and gatherings.
2. BCG's AI Radar 2026: As AI Investments Surge, CEOs Take the Lead
BCG's January 2026 survey of 2,360 executives across 16 markets, including 640 CEOs, is the definitive read on who has claimed the decision. Seventy-two percent of CEOs now call themselves the main AI decision-maker, double the share a year earlier, and corporations expect to roughly double AI spending in 2026. Half of CEOs believe their job is on the line if AI doesn't pay off, and BCG sorts them into three archetypes, Trailblazers, Pragmatists, and Followers, by roughly 15/70/15 percent.
Who should read it: any CEO before their next board meeting. It tells you which archetype the board already thinks you are.
3. PwC's 29th Global CEO Survey
PwC's January 2026 survey of 4,454 CEOs across 95 countries is the honest counterweight to the confidence numbers. Only 12 percent of CEOs report both cost and revenue benefits from AI, while 56 percent report neither. CEOs with strong AI foundations are three times more likely to report meaningful returns, which is the gap between claiming the decision and having something to show for it.
Who should read it: any CEO who has claimed the AI decision and now needs to explain what it bought. This is the report that asks the follow-up question BCG doesn't.
4. The Conference Board's C-Suite Outlook 2026: Uncertainty and Opportunity
The Conference Board's survey of 1,732 executives, including 771 CEOs, conducted with Ipsos, captures the CEO's double bind in one instrument: 42 percent name AI and technology their top investment priority for 2026, while 30 percent separately name AI the leading external factor that could hurt their business. The same technology is the biggest opportunity and the biggest risk on the same survey.
Who should read it: CEOs writing next year's strategy memo. It's the cleanest statement of why the AI bet and the AI risk are the same paragraph now.
5. PwC's 2026 Global AI Jobs Barometer
PwC's Jobs Barometer, built on more than one billion job advertisements across 27 countries, is the labor-market answer to the headcount question every CEO eventually gets asked. Companies most exposed to AI have grown headcount faster than the least exposed since 2018, 52 percent against 36 percent. The decoupling story, on this read, is running through growth, not shrinkage, at least so far.
Who should read it: any CEO fielding a board question about AI and jobs. It's the counter-argument to the layoff narrative, with a dataset behind it.
How to Use These Reports Together
Start with the CEO AI Leverage Report for a peer-level view of how the seat around you is actually behaving, who signs, who sells to whom, and how fast the proof is due. Use BCG to benchmark your own confidence against the market's. Use PwC's CEO Survey to keep the confidence honest against the return data. Use The Conference Board to see the opportunity and the risk stated in the same breath. Use the Jobs Barometer when the headcount question comes from the board.
The pattern across all five is the one this report measures. The CEO has claimed the decision faster than the company has produced the proof. The chief executives pulling ahead in 2026 are not the ones with the boldest AI story. They are the ones who can point to a number that closes the distance between what they signed and what they can see.
That is the conversation happening inside Open Future Forum's CEO Private Dinner Series. If you are a chief executive and want to compare notes with peers off the record, openfutureforum.com is the place to start.
Read the CEO AI Leverage Report →
Open Future Forum is a private executive community in Silicon Valley founded in 2019, with 100 events to date across Forum Select private events and Forum Events open programming. Its research program, including the CEO AI Leverage Report, the CFO, CMO, and CISO AI Leverage Reports, the Executive AI Leverage Report, and the AI Transformation Report, is built on first-party data from executives attending Open Future Forum events.