Undoubtedly, artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly changing IT service management (ITSM) capabilities, and hopefully for the better. An earlier ITSM.tools State of AI in ITSM 2025 article shared some headline statistics from an Atomicwork, PeopleCert, and ITSM.tools survey and report. The full report can be downloaded from the Atomicwork website here. This article now shares some of the ITSM correlations found in the AI report data. These haven’t been shared anywhere else (partly to keep the main report an easier read), so hopefully, they will be as interesting to you as they were to me. Please keep reading to find out more, but first, here’s a quick warning about correlations.
Correlations – please “take them with a pinch of salt”
It’s great to find the relationships between the answers to different survey questions. However, please remember the statement that “correlation doesn’t imply causation.”
In layperson’s terms, this means that while there seems to be a connection between data sets, a cause-and-effect relationship, where one variable (the cause) directly influences another variable (the effect), hasn’t been proved.
Hence, while these AI in ITSM correlations are interesting, please remember that a cause-and-effect relationship might not be involved.
Some interesting IT professional AI in ITSM correlations
The origin of IT’s AI adoption needs:
- The likely business or IT role responsible for AI investments differs by organizational size. The C-suite is most likely to lead on AI in organizations with 1-100 employees. For organizations with over 500 employees, IT leadership is more likely to lead. Interestingly, for organizations with 501-2000 employees, the IT team is more likely to lead on AI.
- The primary organization region affects the decision origin of IT investments. European-led organizations are most likely to have AI requirements originate in the C-suite. They’re also most likely to have no AI investments planned. Conversely, North-American-led organizations are most likely to have IT leadership leading on AI investment. Asia (albeit with a smaller sample size) is the only region where the “power hierarchy” is inverted, with the IT team leading on AI investments, followed by IT leadership, and the C-suite in third place. It’s one of the most interesting ITSM correlations.
- The organizational leaders for AI investments also differ significantly across industries. For example, energy and utility companies (albeit with a small sample size) are likelier to have IT teams that originate AI initiatives (versus the alternatives). Another good example is IT companies – those creating software products are more likely to have C-suite-led AI initiatives than non-software IT companies.
IT budget spend:
- AI investment levels differ by organizational size. The smallest organizations are most likely to have no investment in AI (either not applicable or no allocation). Conversely, the largest organizations (over 5000 employees) are most likely to spend 10-20% of their IT budgets on AI and significantly more likely to spend more than 20%. Interestingly, organizations with 501-2000 employees are least likely to spend over 20% of their IT budgets on AI.
- European-led organizations are most likely to spend less on AI (which aligns with what appears to be the greatest AI aversion across regions) – there’s a higher degree of either no allocation or less than 10% of the IT budget being spent on AI.
- As with the 2024 survey data, IT companies influence the data and results (and the AI in ITSM correlations). Unsurprisingly, software companies make up nearly 50% of all companies spending more than 20% of their IT budgets on AI. The next “big spender” is Healthcare (albeit with a smaller sample size).
AI’s return on investment (ROI):
- The AI investments originating from the C-suite were least likely to have a positive ROI and significantly more likely to have a negative ROI. Interestingly, the AI investments originating from the IT team were the only ones that did not deliver a negative ROI.
- It’s understandable that Too soon to say was the top response option for all organization-size groups. However, organizations with 2001-5000 employees are most likely to have received a negative ROI from their AI investments. While organizations with 101-500 employees have the largest proportion of positive ROI responses versus negative and neutral.
- The level of AI ROI, or at least the perception of it (and perhaps against expectation levels), also differs by region. European-led organizations are most likely to have received a negative ROI on their AI investments. Conversely, North American-led organizations are most likely to have received a positive ROI.
- Unsurprisingly, Information Technology companies are bullish about the benefits of AI. Although its Energy and Utility and Logistics and Mobility organizations where no respondents reported a negative ROI.
- Most Negative AI ROI responses (94%) come from organizations with No allocation or less than 10% of the IT budget allocated to IT initiatives. Conversely, 71% of Positive AI ROI and only 19% of Neutral responses come from organizations with more than 10% of the IT budget spent on AI initiatives.
Trust in AI:
- All industries thought AI-driven IT systems couldn’t be trusted to make autonomous decisions without human oversight. IT Software companies were the closest to voting in favor of trust, with 28 Yes to 30 No responses.
- The more that’s spent on AI initiatives, the more likely it is that trust in AI-enabled systems has increased – although the reverse might also be true.
- Not a single Australian and New Zealand respondent stated that they trust AI-driven systems (albeit from a small sample). European-led organizations are the next least trusting of AI (in terms of Yes versus No responses). European and Australian and New Zealand led organizations are also the only regions where the Increased trust responses are not the most popular response option. Plus, the European responses make up nearly half the Reduced trust responses despite being only 36% of the survey respondents.
- Interestingly (it was an unexpected ITSM correlation), the relative level or split of AI trust responses is virtually equal across all organization sizes. However, the change in AI trust over the last 12 months does differ by organization size. The smaller organizations (1-100, 101-500, and 501-2000 employees) saw a slightly larger reduction in AI trust. In contrast, organizations with over 5000 employees saw the largest increase in AI trust.
- Respondents from Logistics and Mobility organizations (albeit from a small sample) and Business Consulting and Services organizations, closely followed by IT Software companies, were most likely to have seen an increase in AI trust over the last 12 months. Education and manufacturing organizations were most likely to see a reduction in AI trust.
- Increased trust in AI-enabled systems was far higher for AI investments originating from the IT team. Conversely, the AI investments originating from the C-suite saw the largest reduction in AI trust. Perhaps linked to the ROI position.
- Trust in AI-driven IT systems correlates with AI ROI success. Plus, all of the Negative AI trust responses were from respondents reporting a negative ROI from AI investments. We seem to have a “chain” here – that AI spending leads to AI success, which leads to AI trust (or AI trust leads to AI spend, which leads to AI success). The increase in AI trust in the last 12 months also correlates with AI ROI success.
Bonus interesting end-user AI in ITSM correlations
Here are a few more ITSM correlations to get you thinking.
AI usage by IT:
- There’s a correlation between existing AI use and the view of AI use. For example, Customer Support or Success has least encountered AI for IT support and is most adverse to its use. Design is most engaged with AI use for IT support and is the highest scorer for “Yes, and it helps.”
End-user “free AI tool” usage frequency:
- The use of ChatGPT and other free AI tools for work differs by business function. Customer Support or Success is the least likely to use free AI tools for their work. Design uses them most, followed by Product Management, HR, Marketing, and Engineering.
- There’s a strong correlation between respondents who use ChatGPT (and similar) and whether their IT team uses AI for support. Conversely, those respondents without corporate AI use are less likely to use ChatGPT and other free AI tools for their work.
- The level of ChatGPT or other free AI tool use also correlates with corporate AI Chatbot use – the respondents who prefer to use the corporate AI Chatbot are more likely to use ChatGPT or similar regularly. The respondents who don’t use ChatGPT or similar regularly are more likely to use a support portal form or telephone (email use for IT support was pretty consistent across free AI tool use).
AI usage perspective:
- The level of concern about corporate AI use differs by business function. Product Management is least concerned about how their organization uses AI, closely followed by HR and Customer Support or Success. Marketing is most concerned about corporate AI use.
- The level of respondents who stated that they’re not concerned about AI use is very similar, no matter the level of IT support use. However, the respondents with zero IT support contact in the last six months are twice as likely to state that there’s no AI use in their organization. Interestingly, from an ITSM correlations perspective, respondents who haven’t contacted IT support in the last six months are also far more likely not to use ChatGPT or similar free AI tools.
- Close to 90% of the respondents selecting AI Chatbot as their primary IT support contact channel are happy that their IT team is using AI for IT support. Oddly, the second highest level is for Chatbot (non-AI) at nearly two-thirds. The greatest resistance to using AI for IT support is from respondents who currently use the support portal form as their primary contact channel.
There’s a lot to digest here, and please remember that “correlation doesn’t imply causation.” It might be helpful to read these AI in ITSM correlations in the context of the formal report, The State of AI in IT 2025 report, which can be downloaded here.
There’s also an AI in ITSM webinar in which we’ll discuss the report findings. You can sign up via the link if it interests you.
Stephen Mann
Principal Analyst and Content Director at the ITSM-focused industry analyst firm ITSM.tools. Also an independent IT and IT service management marketing content creator, and a frequent blogger, writer, and presenter on the challenges and opportunities for IT service management professionals.
Previously held positions in IT research and analysis (at IT industry analyst firms Ovum and Forrester and the UK Post Office), IT service management consultancy, enterprise IT service desk and IT service management, IT asset management, innovation and creativity facilitation, project management, finance consultancy, internal audit, and product marketing for a SaaS IT service management technology vendor.