New global survey shows a stark divide between firms strategically prepared for AI with unified platforms and those hindered by skills gaps and foundational system disconnects
A new report, released by Certinia and co-sponsored by Salesforce, reveals that the full-sprint race to adopt advanced Artificial Intelligence is creating a stark performance divide across the services economy.
The 2025 Global Service Dynamics Report, based on a survey of over 1,000 global services leaders conducted by Dimensional Research, found that while an astonishing 83% of firms are already using or plan to use Agentic AI with their commercial Professional Services Automation (PSA) software within the next 12 months, the value from this investment is not distributed equally—creating a widening gap between firms that are strategically prepared and those that are not.
“The velocity of AI adoption in the services sector is remarkable,” said David Gehringer, Principal at Dimensional Research. “However, the data also clearly indicates that a significant profitability gap is emerging between firms that have the foundational data and systems in place and those that are simply chasing the technology.”
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Key findings from the 2025 Global Service Dynamics Report include:
- Economic change is viewed as the biggest external threat, along with the pace of AI innovation: The top external pressure identified by leaders is significant economic change (54%), followed by the pace of AI innovation (52%) and rising labor costs (48%).
- Amid tighter financial conditions, Professional Services Organizations (PSOs) are increasingly viewed as strategic profit centers: 66% of companies view their PSO as a profit center (up 3 percentage points from 2024), and the segment of firms targeting elite 40%+ margins is set to more than double in 2025.
- A major ‘say-do’ gap in collaboration persists: Leaders widely acknowledge that aligning sales, delivery, and customer success improves key outcomes like margins (61%) and customer retention (59%). But the report reveals a major execution gap: only 36% of PS teams proactively collaborate across these functions.
- The response to challenges is AI-centric: To mitigate top external challenges, the most profitable PSOs are turning to AI. Their top three tactics include hiring talent with AI skillsets (53%), developing proprietary AI solutions (53%), and utilizing commercial software with AI capabilities (49%).
- The race to deploy Agentic AI is on: The report reveals a massive push toward autonomous capabilities, with 83% of firms already using or planning to deploy Agentic AI with their PSA software within the next 12 months.
- AI adoption faces key hurdles: The top two obstacles slowing widespread AI adoption are a lack of internal AI skills (35%) and navigating compliance issues (35%).
- Investment in strategic technologies to unify operations separates leaders from laggards: The report reveals high-profit PSOs invest differently in their technology. They are 30% more likely to use PSA software for core functions like project management (52% vs. 40%) than their less profitable peers, who often still rely on disconnected tools and spreadsheets.
“The 2025 Global Service Dynamics Report reveals an extraordinary appetite among services organizations to deploy advanced AI quickly,” said Raju Malhotra, Chief Product & Technology Officer at Certinia. “AI agents will soon reshape how services work is performed, decisions are formulated, and value is delivered. This disruption will favor organizations built on a strong data foundation that provides a unified, real-time view to empower the emerging human-agent and agent-to-agent collaboration models. Having that seamless visibility, from initial client engagement through project execution and into ongoing success, is the new prerequisite for elite profitability and industry leadership.”
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“This report validates the services industry’s swift advance towards autonomous AI. ‘Business-aware’ AI agents will undertake strategic tasks with deep customer understanding, much like experienced professionals—and this future is materializing quickly, making the human-AI collaborative model increasingly central,” said Alice Steinglass, Executive Vice President and General Manager, Salesforce Platform at Salesforce. “The key is a unified AI-powered customer platform. When every service team draws from one connected customer view, from initial engagement to long-term value, AI can deliver its most transformative end-to-end service experiences.”
“Financial resilience starts with operational visibility. Smart leaders know the high cost of revenue leakage and wasted time on finding the right information from disconnected systems,” said R “Ray” Wang, CEO at Constellation Research. “The Global Service Dynamics Report makes clear that for services firms, the most durable, all-weather businesses are the ones that achieve financial precision by aligning the entire customer journey, from sales and delivery through to customer success. That unified approach has become the defining competitive advantage.”