New Zealand Is Buying AI Fast, but the Missing Piece Is Skilled People

News · 2026-09-16 · 5 min read

Companies in New Zealand have plenty of AI tools. What many of them do not have is a plan for the people who must work with those tools. This is the main message of Deloitte's newly released Tech Trends 2026 report for New Zealand. If you care about building a strong workforce, and not only a strong set of software, it is a message worth thinking about.

Where the AI Money Is Going

One figure explains the problem clearly: in New Zealand organisations, 93% of AI spending goes to technology and only 7% goes to people and skills.

New Zealand already has an ageing workforce and ongoing labour shortages in the regions. In that situation, this split is more than unbalanced. It is a warning sign. Businesses are buying new capability much faster than they are developing it in their own people.

Changing the Work, Not Just Adding a Tool

Deloitte's Matt Dalton spoke very directly. He said the time for AI experiments is finished. From now on, the advantage goes to organisations that are willing to redesign how work is actually done. Simply attaching a chatbot to an old process is not enough.

This difference is very important for HR leaders, workforce planners and mobility teams. If you put a copilot into an old workflow, you do not get a more capable team. You only get one more tool in the same job description. The report calls this "shallow adoption", and it seems to be everywhere. Around the world, only about one in eight organisations has put agentic AI into real production. Most others are stuck with pilot projects. These pilots create activity, but not value.

For businesses that focus on talent and migration, this is where the real opportunity is. In 2026, the organisations that move ahead will not be the ones holding the most licences. They will be the ones that actively rethink roles, retrain staff for higher-value work, and find the specialist skills needed to run teams that mix humans and automation well.

People and Machines Will Share the Job

Deloitte calls 2026 the year of the "hybrid human and silicon workforce". AI systems and robots will take over more routine, repetitive or dangerous tasks. This frees people, or forces them, to move into roles that need judgement, creativity and deep technical knowledge.

This change has a clear link to recruitment and mobility. Automation is spreading into agriculture, utilities, infrastructure inspection and transport. In these areas, New Zealand's geography and spread-out population already make staffing difficult. Demand for workers will not fall. Instead, the type of demand will change. Businesses will need:

hands-on technical operators who can run and maintain autonomous systems, not only people who use AI in an office;
specialists for regional sectors and sectors with heavy infrastructure, where physical AI such as drones, autonomous inspection and remote robotics is growing fastest;
local workers who have been upskilled into higher-value roles, together with targeted international recruitment where local skills gaps cannot be filled quickly enough.

Dalton's comment about young people building "capabilities" is not just a nice phrase about training. It shows that the skills pipeline, and not the software licence, will decide which companies really gain value from AI.

Online Attacks Make Skilled Teams Even More Important

The report also warns that AI is making cyberattacks faster and smarter. Criminals now use automated tools to run phishing campaigns and look for weak points more quickly than human security teams can react. More physical infrastructure, such as aviation, healthcare and transport, now depends on digital systems. Because of this, the risks from teams that are short of staff or short of skills grow bigger too.

The lesson is the same as before: technology without the right people behind it is a risk, not a benefit.

An Economic Question, Not Only a Tech One

Deloitte's framing is really about the economy more than about technology. New Zealand is a small market with limited resources. Getting the balance between workforce and AI strategy wrong there is not a small mistake. The damage keeps building over time. But getting it right gives a real advantage, because very few competitors are doing the harder work of redesigning roles and rebuilding skills pipelines. Most are only buying software.

So for businesses asking where their next technical, specialist or hard-to-find talent will come from, the 93/7 split is the figure to remember. The tools have already been bought. The truly scarce thing is people who can use them well.

A Tip for Skilled Workers in Indonesia

If you work with machines, systems or technology, this trend is worth following. Prepare an English-language CV that clearly shows your practical technical skills and any training you have completed. If an employer or visa asks for an English test such as IELTS or PTE, start preparing early so you are ready when the right opportunity appears.

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