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New OECD data shows NZ’s economy will take more than 30 years to double in size unless major structural and cultural changes are made to how organisations operate. The modelling shows New Zealand’s real GDP, currently at US$216 billion, is not expected to double until 2055.[1] While the nation’s economy is projected to grow by nearly 48% by 2040, this expansion is largely driven by population growth and increased labour input, rather than meaningful improvements in productivity. New Zealand’s GDP per hour worked, once comparable to Scandinavian countries like Denmark, Finland, and Sweden, is now on average 40% lower than those economies. This long-term underperformance highlights the depth of NZ’s productivity challenge and signals a widening gap not just in economic output, but in living standards, wage potential and long-term competitiveness.[2] Experts say that the rapid adoption of AI will not be enough on its own to reverse this trend and significantly boost productivity. Despite the transformative potential of AI and automation, they say that without a simultaneous shift in how organisations lead, structure and empower their people, the implementation of new technology risks amplifying the structural inefficiencies holding back productivity gains. Craig Steel, a workplace performance expert from Vantaset and author of Transforming New Zealand’s Productivity, says the country has overestimated what technology alone can deliver without first building the leadership capability and workplace culture needed to make those tools effective. “There’s a misguided belief that AI will close the gap for any organisation that applies it. But what we’ve seen is that when organisations adopt technology without modernising their leadership and culture, the gains they were seeking rarely occur “If AI is layered on top of disconnected leadership models and compliance-based systems, it won’t lift people, it will marginalise them,” he says. Steel warns that New Zealand is at […]