Healthcare benefits strategy survey: AI strategy & adoption

Grokker Innovation Labs asked HR leaders how they’re approaching AI in the area of employee benefits. Their answers point to three gaps between the proof CFOs want and the way AI is being deployed.

• Organizations demand benefits ROI, yet few name the preventive, cost-steering use of AI that would help produce that proof.
  
• Fragmented benefits access is associated with employees abandoning their search for answers, leading to missed care and lower benefits utilization. 
  
• Much AI adoption is happening by default, often before a budget is set, which makes now the time to check whether the solution is truly built for health questions.
  
  

Every extra path to a benefit is another place to give up.
Respondents whose organizations rely on more navigation methods to help employees struggling to find or use their benefits report far more employees abandoning the search without an answer.

• One method 13%
• Two methods 33%
• All three methods 56%

By number of navigation methods an organization relies on: static guides, manual HR support, vendor chatbots.

VENDOR-SPECIFIC CHATBOTS SHOW THE WIDEST GAP.

• Use chatbots 52%
• Don’t 19%
• 2.7X the give-up rate where chatbots are used.

Low utilization may be an access problem as much as a content or vendor-quality problem.

Adoption is moving faster than the plan for it.
Most organizations are building on what they already have, often before budget, owners, or success measures are settled.

• 54% say AI budget status is "not yet determined." Among organizations that already implemented AI: 57%.
• 3 in 4 plan to use native HRIS features or internal builds. Only 8% are buying a dedicated AI tool.
• 50% name data privacy and HIPAA governance as a top barrier, the most-cited of any. Higher among implementers (57%) than those still considering (35%).
  

The tools most organizations are reaching for first are often the ones least designed for health.

See what the data says, and what to do about it.
The full report goes beyond the headline numbers, with the survey results behind each gap and practical next steps for your team.

WHAT’S INSIDE:

• Complete results for each gap. Charts, bases, and the limits of what the data can show.
  
• Three exercises to try this month. Including a 30-minute walk through your own benefits search.
  
• Five questions before your next AI decision. Built for HR, Finance, IT Security, and Legal to answer together.

A New Way to Well
About the data. Grokker Innovation Labs, 2026-27 Healthcare Benefits Strategy Survey: AI Strategy & Adoption. Responses from HR and benefits professionals; survey closed. Responses are self-reported, and the patterns shown are associations, not proof of cause. Questions use skip logic, so each figure shows the number of respondents it is based on.