Why AI Readiness in Healthcare Starts With People

Caroline DeVore, Executive Director of Growth and Innovation at StudioNorth, and Matt Wright, a human factors and change-management expert, recently unpacked why AI adoption keeps stalling inside healthcare organizations. Their view is clear. The real challenge is human, not technical.

AI Adoption Depends on Emotional Change as Much as Workflow Change

Wright put it plainly when he said AI “is not just the calculator that lets me do the calculations faster,” noting that when change reaches a certain scale, “fear and grief can turn into an identity emotion: who am I going to be after this?”

That fear is familiar to marketers, communicators, and patient experience leaders who have spent years building expertise that suddenly feels unsettled by new technology. When that expertise feels less certain or less valued, it shows up in quiet hesitation and subtle recalibration long before it shows up in a project plan.

The Biggest Barrier to AI in Healthcare Is People, Not Technology

DeVore underscored the point with her memorable statement: “This is not a technology question. This is a people question.”

According to the survey of B2B leaders done by StudioNorth, 71% of healthcare leaders say their top AI challenge is skills, people and changement management. In fact “lack of in-house AI skills” and “change management hurdles” were cited far more as the barrier to AI adoption than budget or technology constraints.

In addition, the survey also showed that healthcare leaders rate their organizations’ AI readiness (on average) at only 3 out of 5. Why so low? Interviews by StudioNorth revealed that even when leaders are optimistic, teams often fear:

• Loss of expertise


• Job displacement


• Increased ambiguity around expectations

Healthcare isn’t struggling to get AI, the industry is struggling to absorb it.

Healthcare Leaders Need to Approach AI With Empathy, Personalization, and Trust

DeVore also shared that healthcare leaders approach AI differently from other industries. “Healthcare focused more on empathy… personalization… connecting through a trust barrier,” she said, describing a sector that evaluates AI through a distinctly human lens.

For marketers and patient experience leaders, this tracks. Campaigns, content, and service models rely on trust, and any AI-driven shift immediately raises questions about how personal, credible, or reassuring an experience will feel once the technology is in the mix.

AI’s Cultural Shift Matters More Than Its Technical One

The through-line across these conversations is hard to miss. AI doesn’t land on a blank canvas. It lands on people who carry years of expertise, responsibility, and emotional investment in their work. Marketing and patient experience teams feel this just as strongly as clinicians.

DeVore and Wright will be exploring this topic further at an upcoming Town Hall: AI Readiness – Leading the Human Side of Transformation on December 4^th at 1pm ET.

Learn more about StudioNorth at https://www.studionorth.com/

Connect with Matt Wright at https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-wright-06796bb/