Bosses: Stop telling staff that AI won’t take their jobs
How CHROs can help the workforce navigate AI-driven change by building trust, improving the employee experience, and leading cultural change in HR and talent management. ...
Talent
Taking people to the next level: CHRO priorities
HR leaders identify four priorities to get businesses through further digital disruption and geopolitical turmoil.
Any hope that HR leaders harbored that there would be at least a pause in digital disruption and geopolitical and economic uncertainty in 2026 seems unlikely to be fulfilled. The World Economic Forum’s annual Global Risks Report found that around half of business, political, academic, and social commentators expect the next two years to be as “turbulent” or “stormy” as the preceding two.
AI will continue to reshape how people work, while political and economic uncertainty and increasing evidence of climate risk will continue to challenge mental health and well-being. The people function sits at the eye of this storm, and organizations that fail to offer it adequate support risk severe commercial consequences. Today’s effective HR leader bridges the gap between their people and the execution of wider business strategy.
We asked CHROs about their priorities and four imperatives stand out:
1 – Supporting AI adoption
HR leaders are shifting their focus to enterprise-wide adoption of AI. HR leaders consistently stress that their function’s responsibility is not only to modernize its own workflows but also to train and equip people across the organization to take full advantage of AI. This involves providing accessible AI tools and learning resources, facilitating knowledge sharing, and framing AI not as a threat but as an opportunity for the evolution of skills and roles.
Anna Lundström, CHRO of Swedish music-streaming company Spotify, has worked closely with Gustav Söderström, the company’s co-president, CPO, and CTO, to introduce all employees to AI training and tools. “Rolling this out in a collaborative way has been very effective,” Lundström explains. “Gustav speaks from his own deep experience with AI and how it is integrated into the Spotify product, and I oversee the training and employee engagement to ensure it lands across every department.”
In 2025, Spotify extended invitations to its annual Hack Week beyond the R&D team to include the entire workforce. The event offered staff the opportunity to experiment with AI and pitch use cases related to their roles. The result was a surge in internal AI initiatives.
While the primary focus is to support organizational adoption of AI, HR leaders will also seek to explore the potential for using technology within their own function. With HR departments already widely using AI for CV screening, HR ticketing, and HR chatbots, performance reviews are next in line for an AI makeover.
“Not long ago, workers felt confident that their skillsets would remain relevant for the foreseeable future.”
2 – Turning talent into applicable skills
Not long ago, workers felt confident that their skillsets would remain relevant for the foreseeable future. But in light of the rapid advances in AI and other technologies, workforce skills may need to be updated as often as every two years.
In the current business environment, HR leaders are focuing on upskilling at scale. French insurer AXA has set up a number of academies to support different approaches to learning and help employees develop both soft and hard skills. Its Tech, Data, and AI Academy, for example, includes basic training for all employees, as well as leader-specific and function-specific courses to support strategy and day-to-day operations. “Our goal is to democratize learning, to make each employee the owner of his or her training,” explains Sandrine Girszyn, CHRO at AXA headquarters.
As required skillsets change, HR leaders are seeking to initiate a parallel adjustment in the way their organizations think about work, focusing less on traditional roles and more on the skills needed to complete specific tasks.
“Since the Second Industrial Revolution, the whole construct of work has been driven by the idea of a job. Jobs are the currency of work,” explains Tanuj Kapilashrami, Chief Strategy and Talent Officer at Standard Chartered. “Today, that is a problem, because technology and broader market shifts are rapidly disrupting established jobs. It’s leaving a lot of value on the table in terms of lost productivity, because people are typecast based on their job, with no recognition of their underlying skills.”
For Standard Chartered, the solution was to establish the Talent Marketplace. Rather than focusing on job descriptions, the platform enables employees to create profiles that showcase their skills. Managers across the organization can post opportunities that require skills not available within their existing teams. AI scans each new post and plays matchmaker.
The results speak for themselves. As of July 2025, over 60% of Standard Chartered employees were using the Talent Marketplace platform. The initiative has helped the bank save over $55m in hiring costs and fees since 2023.
Virgin recently created a leadership program, Trailblazers, which supports executives in developing the skills required to handle and communicate change.
3 – Equipping future leaders to succeed
The leadership pipeline is thinning. Issues ranging from the shortening shelf-life of skillsets to a reluctance among younger generations to seek middle-management roles mean organizations risk running out of leaders.
“We need our leaders to be very comfortable with technology, but to maintain that really strong, human-centered approach,” says Nikki Humphrey, CPO at Virgin Group. “It’s a difficult balance to attain, which requires people like me to do some really creative work with our leaders.”
This year, HR leaders will focus on establishing clear guidelines on the core skills and attributes the business requires their managers and executives to develop. CHROs will also create tools to support employees in their career progression. Virgin recently created a leadership program, Trailblazers, which supports executives in developing the skills required to handle and communicate change. The program employs a variety of training techniques to cater to different learning styles, from gamification to face-to-face and peer group work.
4 – Improving mental health and wellbeing
Mental health continues to be an important issue in the workplace. Stress, depression, and anxiety wipe out 12 billion workdays a year, costing the global economy about $1tn. Despite this, individuals are increasingly exposed to harmful influences. As well as the universal pressures of geopolitical instability and demographic-focused issues, such as the potentially harmful effects of social media use on younger people, there are issues specific to the workplace. The use of ChatGPT, for instance, has been found to lower job satisfaction and diminish cognitive function. These pressures are compounded by the mental health impacts of geopolitical instability and excessive social media use more broadly across the population.
HR leaders must consider what they can do in terms of prevention and support. AXA is pursuing several initiatives, including its “We Care” program, through which staff can access regular check-ups and apply for additional days off to manage their health and wellbeing. Girszyn says that the initiative has benefited productivity and reduced the need for sick leave.
Similarly, in 2025, Spotify launched a new internal platform to personalize employee well-being. From therapy sessions to financial and legal advice, the Modern Health platform by Heart & Soul allows employees to tailor their own wellbeing program, reinforced by a 24/7 support line. This tool now serves employees in over 40 countries.
What differentiates the most effective HR leaders is their strategic proximity to and understanding of the business.
HR becomes a strategic partner
Today, boards expect their CHROs not only to understand the business’s people but to create value and help to mitigate organizational risks. What differentiates the most effective HR leaders is their strategic proximity to and understanding of the business.
“Business is much more complex today, so we can’t afford to just work in silos,” explains Byron Clayton, CHRO at Pandora, the world’s largest jewelry brand. “It’s about creating that bridge between being strategic, understanding the financial mechanisms of the company, and actually feeling the pain that our people have to deal with every day.”
Whether it’s working alongside technology leaders for AI adoption, quantifying the financial returns of reskilling over external hiring, or spending time on the front line to gain an understanding of employee experience, successful HR leaders are immersing themselves in the commercial realities of their organizations. This willingness to “get their hands dirty” gives HR greater credibility and influence at the executive table and in the workplace in general.
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