Future-Proof Your Leadership With AI Skills Every Executive Needs
This article originally appeared on Forbes.com.
While company leaders waver, employees have already gone all-in on AI.
A McKinsey research report published in January 2025 explored companies’ AI readiness reveals a startling disconnect: C-suite leaders believe only 4% of their workforce uses generative AI for significant portions of their daily work. The reality? At least 13% of employees—more than triple the executives’ estimates—report regularly using AI tools for more than 30% of their tasks.
This gap suggests more than a simple miscalculation—it points to a critical leadership blind spot that could leave companies exposed as AI dramatically reshapes workplace productivity, workflows and output.
Indeed, many executives currently find themselves in one of three vulnerable positions:
Investing in AI without a clear pathway to integration into the company’s workflows (as the McKinsey AI readiness research discovered)
Rushing to replace talent with automation (a ResumeBuilder.com survey of 1,000 U.S. business leaders found that 23.5% of US companies have already replaced workers with ChatGPT)
Avoiding AI adoption entirely due to uncertainty, skepticism or overwhelm (PwC’s 28th Annual Global CEO Survey found that only a third of CEOs have a high degree of trust in having AI embedded into key processes)
So what’s the way forward? The framework below offers a practical roadmap for executives ready to develop the AI skills needed to thrive in this constantly shifting landscape.
Use AI To Lead Better In Three Critical Ways
For today’s executives, AI offers powerful ways to enhance leadership effectiveness in three critical ways—from organizational strategy to team dynamics to personal growth.
Enhancing Organizational Vision
When properly deployed, AI becomes your strategic co-pilot, offering perspectives you, your advisors and your leadership team might miss:
Run regular PESTLE analyses to understand how Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal and Environmental factors might impact your company.
Analyze competitor strategies to identify market opportunities and strengthen differentiating factors.
Predict future demand patterns and optimize operations.
Brainstorm new products or services that align with emerging trends.
These analyses often reveal important weaknesses, warning signs and patterns that might otherwise go unnoticed. While the insights might be uncomfortable, avoiding or ignoring them isn’t a leadership strategy.
Transforming Team Communication
AI can enhance how you communicate with your team and even bridge existing conflict or friction. A 2024 study by researchers at the University of Southern California, revealed that AI text generators can write empathetic responses to complex prompts. Here’s how to experiment with AI to improve your communications:
Tailor your messages to individual team members based on their communication preferences and the specific historical context.
Practice difficult conversations before having them.
Improve how you give and receive feedback.
Develop strategies for addressing and resolving conflicts in the workplace.
Despite what many fear—and as explored by Jacqueline Carter, Rasmus Hougaard, Marissa Afton and Katharina Kassubeck in Harvard Business Review—AI can help you become a more compassionate and empathetic leader. This is especially valuable when you are overloaded, under-resourced or have fallen into leadership ruts or counterproductive habits.
Deepening Self-Awareness
AI can be a powerful reflective partner, bringing objectivity and fresh perspectives to your personal leadership development. Use AI as a personal growth tool:
Identify potential blind spots in your thinking and decision-making.
Explore the right questions you should be asking as a leader.
Develop a personalized executive leadership growth and development plan.
Challenge your assumptions about complex challenges.
When used thoughtfully, this personalized approach to leadership development can surface patterns and solutions even the most self-aware executives miss—particularly in areas where improvement wasn’t previously considered necessary or possible.
Deepening Self-Awareness
AI can be a powerful reflective partner, bringing objectivity and fresh perspectives to your personal leadership development. Use AI as a personal growth tool:
Identify potential blind spots in your thinking and decision-making.
Explore the right questions you should be asking as a leader.
Develop a personalized executive leadership growth and development plan.
Challenge your assumptions about complex challenges.
When used thoughtfully, this personalized approach to leadership development can surface patterns and solutions even the most self-aware executives miss—particularly in areas where improvement wasn’t previously considered necessary or possible.
