Are you prepared for the ‘Readiness Gap’?

Three years ago this weekend I handed back my corporate laptop and set up True. Happy birthday to us. My co-founder and I started with a shared belief in people-centred change by which we mean doing change with people, not to them.

Back then, we didn’t hear people talking about being people-centred or human-centric very often. It’s encouraging that it’s now much more widely used. Even more encouraging is that it’s no longer framed as a “nice to have”.

Human Centric is a defining thread in the newly published State of the Sector report from Gallagher which is now in its 18th year. More than 1,300 communication and HR professionals took part this year and it's widely regarded as one of the most authoritative global benchmark studies in internal communication.

At 48 pages, it’s not a quick skim, but offers serious insight into what’s working, what’s not, and where the opportunities lie.

The Readiness Gap

At the heart of the report is what it calls the Readiness Gap — the widening distance between the scale of organisational risk and the capability, structure and maturity of communication functions to navigate it.

Change is constant, expectations are rising, and the environment is more complex than ever. Yet our operating models have not evolved at the same pace.

We continue to over-communicate while under-segmenting, favouring volume over precision. Many teams aspire to be strategic partners, yet remain caught in being reactive and tactical. Managers are positioned as a critical channel, but frequently without the tools or clarity to succeed. And across the profession, we still underestimate the operational discipline required to embed change properly and make it stick.

Helpfully, the report doesn’t stop at insight. It concludes with practical guidance for closing the Readiness Gap, setting out a mix of quick wins and longer-term suggestions for future-proofing the function.

Five key takeaways from Gallagher’s State of the Sector report:

1. Human-centric communication is recognised — but not yet embedded. The report defines Human-Centric as one of its six Readiness Index dimensions. The score "an organisation's ability to deliver internal communications that rivals consumer experiences, specifically audience segmentation and agility regarding the tone and format of communications." The global Human-Centric readiness score sits at 55%, suggesting progress but not maturity. While personalization, relevance and accessibility are now positioned as essential rather than optional, the operational reality lags behind the rhetoric.
2. Frustration with channels. While 75% of respondents agree that tailoring messaging is critical, only 20% do it regularly, and just 18% are satisfied with their channel’s ability to personalise communications Without the ability to target messages with precision, communicators default to repetition and broad distribution amplifying noise rather than reducing it. That noise is directly associated with higher perceived risks of audience burnout and information overload.
3. Change is no longer a specialist capability. This year, change communication was ranked the number one required capability (57%). Yet 61% of teams still don’t have a defined change communications approach in their strategy. Many teams are expected to deliver at pace without the fundamentals in place: a clear change narrative; defined channel strategies; or measurement models that track adoption rather than just activity.
4. Workforce readiness is a structural issue. Workforce readiness is emerging as one of the profession’s most significant pressure points. Teams are expected to support continuous transformation while operating with limited capacity, constrained budgets and rising expectations. Nearly 70% of organisations have fewer than six people in a communications role, regardless of organisational size, and one in three report having no dedicated budget. As organisations grow beyond 500 employees, capability often declines while perceived risk increases — creating a growing mismatch between demand and resource.
5. AI divides opinion — capability makes the difference. Sentiment toward AI is broadly positive, but sharply divided by role. Senior leaders tend to see opportunity, while support and administrative colleagues are twice as likely to perceive it as a threat. Capability appears to be the real differentiator. Only 36% say they have the skills and critical thinking needed to use AI effectively. Among “AI-ready” teams — those operating with structure, support and governance — that figure rises to 61%.

If you work in internal communication, change or employee experience, this year’s report is essential reading.

Want to find out more?

Gallagher is running a series of webinars to explore the findings in more depth. In my role as chair of the IABC Heads of Comms SIG, I’ll be facilitating one on Tuesday 3 March, where we’ll be joined by Chris Andrews from Gallagher to unpack the key insights and discuss what they mean in practice for communication teams.

If you’d like to join us, you can register here.