GENERATIVE AI IN THE IT INDUSTRY : A qualitative study on IT consultants' awareness and use of GenAI tools

The launch of ChatGPT in 2022 is often called the breakthrough for the use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI). In a short period of time, this new technology has spread rapidly across several industries, including the IT consulting industry. This has created many new possibilities but also challenges. One of the biggest risks with rapid development is that the needed education and skills development are not able to keep up at the same speed. This can lead to IT consultants using or implementing GenAI solutions without having a sufficient understanding of its possibilities, limitations and security risks. The purpose of this study has been to investigate how well IT consultants understand and manage the GenAI tools, and what risks, and possibilities they bring. Based on a qualitative research approach the study has been conducted by doing semi-structured interviews within a multinational IT consulting company. The study’s result shows a large variation in GenAI competence among IT consultants and that the current level of knowledge largely depends on the individual's own interest and curiosity, rather than on training efforts from their organization. The training is often perceived as too general, and difficult to access. This in turn affects their ability to critically evaluate GenAI’s use cases, which can create challenges in risk management and use it to reach its full potential. The conclusion that can be drawn from the study is that to fully catch the opportunities of GenAI while managing its security challenges, IT consultant firms must move from the individual driven learning to an organizational approach that ensures responsible, structured and strategic competence development.