Leading Effectively in an AI World: Talent and Leadership Strategies for HR Executives

Getting the largest return on AI for your company is mainly about people, and HR leaders must understand how best to create value at the intersection of new technologies and in-house talent. 

To succeed, HR leaders will have to:

• Equip all leaders to harness AI effectively
• Select the best leaders to drive AI strategy forward
• Understand the leadership talent you have today—and the gaps you need to fill 

In this article, we’ll consider how best to approach leadership in an AI world—who you’ll need and how they should lead—and how Heidrick & Struggles is helping companies optimize their AI leadership. 

Our recent survey of executives across industries highlights key features of the current leadership talent landscape, including:

• 48% of executives don’t think they have the right talent in-house to drive AI strategy 
• 82% of leaders say their company’s AI function is now directly included in business strategy; 31% of top AI executives now report directly to the CEO, up nearly 2x from 2023
• 85% of organizations are ready to embrace the challenges of AI 

Together, these results suggest HR leaders must prioritize defining the crucial capabilities needed for leaders to drive business impact and execute critical business strategies and initiatives, including through knowledge and implementation of AI.

That will require consideration of the different dimensions of AI and how those influence organizational and talent decisions, the characteristics and capabilities of high-performing and high-potential AI leaders, and how businesses across sectors are getting their AI leadership right. 

Let’s consider those areas next.

As our survey results suggest, the vast majority of executives say their business’s strategy includes their AI function directly, but nearly half of respondents believe the business lacks the right AI talent in-house. That gap suggests the need for careful consideration of how to optimize AI leadership and impact in your organization. Here are the main factors to keep in mind.

• Organizational design: AI can automate several hierarchical decision-making processes, potentially leading to flatter organizational structures. This can foster quicker decision-making and promote a culture of innovation. 
• Tech readiness: A solid data strategy is the critical foundation for AI capability and one that many businesses overlook.
• Leadership talent impact: Work to understand the impacts of AI tools and platforms on leadership and on current and newly created leadership roles. 
• Ethics & security: Guidelines and guardrails are paramount for AI use, including transparency, accountability, and cybersecurity.

As suggested above, managing AI and related strategy in the new digital landscape is largely a leadership challenge, requiring the right leaders in the right places at the right time. Through our client work and other observations, we’ve found that harnessing the power of others—both within and outside your organization—is crucial for success with AI. The most successful businesses in this regard define their AI strategic objectives, assess how their current talent structure aligns with related goals, and make development choices to gain AI capabilities. 

For example, one business recently created a flexible talent ecosystem for AI expertise, relying on freelancers and part-timers to provide immediate capability. Others are redesigning roles to better reflect AI responsibilities and creating personalized development plans to get people up to speed.

None of it will be easy. Making AI work in your organization will require building capability while addressing executives’ and others’ fears about job security, compliance, privacy, and other areas. The best approach is cross-functional and collaborative as part of a human-centric culture.

Based on interviews with thousands of executives, Heidrick & Struggles understands the top traits that make people successful in top AI and data roles, as laid out below. 

• Storytelling: Managing AI strategy well is largely about translating and simplifying concepts. Effective leaders can excite people about the new technology and the journey the organization will take to harness it. 
• Empathy: More empathic leadership fosters trust around new initiatives. As AI-related strategies arise, they can serve as the foundation to address concerns around job security, privacy, and others, as noted earlier.
• Culture of creativity: While AI can handle more routine processes and analytics, an organization's people can spark innovation. The best envision the extraordinary and must create a culture of creativity to ensure this happens. 
• Agility: Technologies are always evolving, and leaders must adapt strategies and skill sets. Experimentation and intellectual curiosity are key.
• Transparency and trust: Leaders must be transparent about how AI is used within the organization and its potential impact on employees and stakeholders.

While many businesses hire a dedicated top AI strategy executive (Chief AI Officer or others), similar responsibilities may fall under a role such as Chief Business Transformation Leader. It’s less about the title than how the leader carries out the role using the five traits above. 

Moreover, finding the right AI leaders is challenging, given the hyper-fast pace and evolution of this space. 

Leading in an AI World: Real-world Examples

As the case examples below suggest, businesses across sectors benefit from partnering with us on a proactive approach to AI talent.

$14B industrial business: The new CIO of an industrial business with 53,000 employees sought to understand if the organization had key talent for the IT department’s innovation transformation. With the help of Heidrick & Struggles they assessed department leaders on the innovation dimension, finding only 50% met key criteria. Leadership used the opportunity to identify high-performing in-house talent to deploy against strategic priorities, develop high-potential leaders further, and secure interim and full-time talent to augment as needed.

Global energy business: The CHRO of this multinational met quarterly with its board to assess progress toward strategic goals, focusing on existing and emerging leadership talent. Given the company's long-tenured workforce, succession planning was crucial for ensuring business continuity. By partnering with Heidrick & Struggles and incorporating Heidrick Navigator into these reviews, the company leveraged real-time data to conduct scenario planning, identifying leadership gaps and planning for future succession effectively.

Publicly listed fintech: Leadership recognized the need for a transformative AI strategy and decided to add a Chief AI and Analytics Officer to the Executive Leadership Team (ELT). This leader would drive AI implementation both internally and externally, enhancing the customer and employee experience. We assisted in identifying the ideal candidate and assessing talent gaps essential for executing the strategy. To bridge these gaps, we provided on-demand talent solutions while co-developing a long-term talent strategy.

Conclusion

As you shape your forward-thinking leadership approach in an AI-driven world, consider the impact beyond technology—extending to the creative minds and data that drive smarter decisions:

• AI and data leadership isn’t just about tech expertise: It’s more about connecting AI innovation to people. Effective leaders simplify the complexity, listen with empathy, adapt with agility, and build trust with transparency. Ultimately, human-guided tech provides positive, innovative results in organizations.
• HR leaders connect the leadership talent dots: Even if you’re still learning about AI yourself, you can take a proactive role with AI in your organization to understand the leaders you need for AI strategy and to find and develop them internally and externally.
• Data is critical: Understanding the capabilities you have and how to upskill your workforce requires a data-driven approach. That’s the foundation for innovation and execution.

Ultimately, leading in an AI world is about finding leaders who can use AI as a force for positive human evolution. For example, harnessing this generation's technology to free up time for collaboration on strategy development, coaching, and feedback. AI should never take the place of leadership but instead augment and enhance it.

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How can you lead better in an AI world and set the right HR strategies for impact? We encourage you to take action in this domain, no matter how large or small. We offer the Next Steps below as a practical, strategic way to get started in your organization.

Leading in an AI World: Next Steps for HR Leaders—Follow the 3 As

These big-picture steps—the Three As—can help you evaluate the AI talent and capabilities you have in-house, identify gaps related to strategic objectives, and determine how best to fill those gaps for current and future success.

• Assess: What leadership roles and people have AI knowledge and capability? How best to measure this? Take stock of the AI talent in your organization, especially at the leadership level. You could start with a high-level, manual assessment but consider a more systematic, digital assessment for an even more comprehensive approach.
• Align: How does the AI talent in-house line up with capabilities needed to execute on current and evolving business strategy? Where are the gaps? Once you have a better sense of AI capabilities, match it up with strategic objective to understand what might be missing.
• Act: How can you fill the gaps to develop a more future-ready leadership and organization? Think proactively about the best, most efficient way to fill gaps in AI leadership and talent with high-performing hires who can deliver immediate and longer-term value. We can help.