2026 PROJECT AND PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT PRIORITIES REPORT
The era of Intelligent Work Management
Nearly every (97%) project and portfolio management (PPM) professional is experimenting with AI, yet fewer than half (46%) trust it to act without human supervision.
This gap reveals the central challenge facing project and portfolio management in 2026: AI adoption is racing ahead of AI readiness.
This report explores how over 1,600 portfolio leaders around the globe are navigating the AI shift while grappling with trust gaps, tool sprawl, and skill deficits that undermine their ability to deliver strategic impact.
The data is clear: AI alone isn't the answer. Intelligent Work Management is.
intro
The Intelligent Work Management imperative
With 98% of PPM professionals reporting the need to reprioritize work due to business change, and 74% worried their role could be replaced by AI within five years, the pressure to "do AI" has never been more intense.
Yet 87% report that AI still requires human input at least some of the time, and 61% say their current tools make it difficult to demonstrate measurable contributions to project outcomes.
Success requires Intelligent Work Management platforms that unite people, data, and AI across the entire enterprise — not fragmented point solutions or productivity suites limited to single-vendor ecosystems.
Evolution of work
What is Intelligent Work Management?
Smartsheet pioneered Collaborative Work Management and now defines the Intelligent Work Management category, evolving from basic collaboration to intelligent orchestration that eliminates silos between strategy and execution.
The future of portfolio management isn't about choosing between people and technology. It's about orchestrating both intelligently. Our data reveals three critical AI tensions:
- Adoption without enablement
- Anxiety amid opportunity
- Activity without outcomes
Tension 1
Adoption without enablement
Nearly all (97%) PPM professionals say they already use AI to support their work.
But adoption varies by role: executives report more frequent use (94% at least occasionally), while individual contributors (ICs) most often "rarely" use it (31%).
This signals a disconnect between leadership mandates and frontline confidence, and reveals AI tools remain isolated from the workflows that need them most.
When AI capabilities exist separately from unified work management systems, organizations multiply fragmentation rather than eliminate it.
The takeaway: Without an easy-to-use platform that embeds AI within existing workflows and unites digital and human workers in intuitive — but governed — systems, adoption will remain uneven and impact will stay limited.
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Tension 2
Anxiety amid opportunity
While enthusiasm for AI runs high, so does anxiety.
74% of PPM professionals worry their roles could be replaced within five years, but 87% see it as an opportunity to transform how they work.
For most, the path forward isn't resistance, but redefinition — embracing an organizational approach to AI augmentation that enables human professionals to focus on higher-value strategic, analytical, and leadership work.
This human + AI approach treats AI agents and agentic managers as digital full-time employees (FTEs) who work alongside human teams, handling routine execution while humans focus on judgment, strategy, and complex problem-solving.
This isn't about headcount replacement; it's about workforce augmentation that eliminates execution bottlenecks and breaks down silos between people and intelligence.
The takeaway: Organizations that embrace an approach with AI as the enabler and humans at the center, will gain the agility, clarity, and confidence to thrive in the AI shift.
Tension 3
Activity without outcomes
Despite widespread AI adoption, only 39% say their current tools make it easy to demonstrate their contributions to project outcomes.
AI can automate tasks and surface insights, but without the right system to connect them across organizational boundaries, it can't demonstrate measurable impact.
Execution silos prevent visibility into how AI-generated outputs connect to strategic outcomes, leaving leaders unable to prove value or demonstrate ROI.
The takeaway: Without unified platforms that connect AI capabilities to measurable — and relevant — business outcomes, organizations generate activity without demonstrating value.
Key Callout
The business impact of Intelligent Work Management
Organizations that eliminate execution silos through Intelligent Work Management achieve breakthrough performance:
- Productivity increase: Greater productivity gains through unified orchestration of human and AI workers
- Risk reduction: Better risk mitigation through governed AI with audit trails and rollback capabilities
- Cost reduction: Consolidation of fragmented tools into unified platforms that eliminate administrative overhead
- Revenue growth: Faster time-to-market and improved resource utilization that enables capacity for new opportunities
Conclusion
From AI adoption to intelligent orchestration
As organizations transform their PPM capabilities, they face a clear choice: adopt tools that create new fragments of automation, or embrace Intelligent Work Management platforms that orchestrate human expertise and AI across unified, governed systems that demonstrate measurable outcomes in productivity, cost reduction, risk mitigation, and revenue growth.
Organizations that choose platforms built for intelligent orchestration enable leaders to adapt faster, collaborate smarter, and drive outcomes with confidence while letting individual contributors deliver quality work at a higher velocity than ever before.
The next era of PPM won't be defined by fear of disruption but by the intelligence of the systems — and people — guiding it.
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RESEARCH Methodology
Survey details
Smartsheet partnered with Dimensional Research to conduct a global online survey with a total of 1,651 project and portfolio management (PPM) professionals from the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Singapore, Japan, and Australia. All participants had responsibilities for PPM and included a mix of ages, job levels, job functions, company sizes, and industries. The survey was fielded in August and September 2025.
