Companies are increasingly managing several transformations at the same time, shortening decision-making cycles and holding executives more accountable for productivity. Leaders are now expected to understand technology, work effectively with data and guide people through uncertainty. As a result, both the skills that determine managerial effectiveness and the criteria used to select candidates for senior executive roles are changing.
Technology implementations, reorganisations, cost-optimisation programmes, regulatory changes and rising customer expectations are increasingly overlapping. Leaders often have to make decisions before they have a complete picture of the situation, while some assumptions need to be revised after projects are already under way. In such conditions, adaptability has a direct impact on business performance. A manager must set the direction, identify risks and determine when assumptions and earlier decisions should be reassessed. At the same time, teams need to understand what is changing and what remains unchanged in terms of objectives, priorities and areas of responsibility.
– At a time when companies are undergoing so many changes, a mature manager should be able to reduce information overload and clearly define accountability. It is equally important to specify and communicate the assumptions behind decisions, as well as the circumstances that might justify reassessing them. This kind of transparency strengthens a leader’s authority because it demonstrates that they take responsibility for their decisions, monitor their consequences and respond when new data challenges earlier assumptions. It is not a sign of weak leadership; it demonstrates a focus on results – says Małgorzata Sułkowska, Partner at Wyser Executive Search.
Technology and data broaden the C-suite mandate
Technology transformation is no longer the exclusive domain of IT departments. The role of the CTO is changing, with technology leaders increasingly helping to shape business strategy, but the responsibilities of other board members are expanding as well. Decisions concerning digitalisation, automation and the use of artificial intelligence now require shared accountability.
Leaders must assess not only whether an investment makes business sense, but also how it will affect the entire organisation – from finance and operations to sales and HR. The success of a project therefore depends on cooperation across all areas of the business.
The broader role of senior executives is also evident in finance. A study by KPMG in Poland and ACCA Poland, conducted among 213 CFOs at medium-sized and large companies, found that 92% of respondents had seen their responsibilities expand in recent years. At the same time, 36% of CFOs have taken on responsibilities outside traditional finance, 31% lead transformation projects and 68% are responsible for analytics and data strategy within their organisations.
Such a broad mandate requires a coherent vision for change. Yet in a survey of senior executives cited in The Future of Jobs Report 2025, as many as 43% of respondents identified a lack of vision among managers as one of the main barriers to AI adoption.
The success of a transformation therefore depends on an organisation’s openness and readiness to implement technology, as well as on leaders’ ability to connect it with business processes, performance and workforce preparedness. This broader responsibility is also changing the criteria used to assess candidates for C-level positions.
– In executive search processes, companies do not assess candidates based on the number of tools they have implemented or their knowledge of specific technologies. What matters far more is the business problem they were able to solve, the decisions they made and the results their transformations delivered. Another important factor is their ability to prepare an organisation for transformation – redesigning processes, engaging teams and successfully guiding people through change – says Piotr Wajgielt, Executive Manager at Wyser Executive Search.
Productivity puts leadership quality to the test
Companies are increasingly focusing on better work organisation, more effective use of technology and the development of workforce skills. Simply increasing workloads is no longer enough to deliver sustainable improvements in performance.
In Poland, organisations seeking to improve efficiency are concentrating primarily on how work is organised. According to Gi Group Holding’s Labour Market Barometer 2026, 39.4% of employers said they had taken steps over the previous year to improve task planning and organisation, 28.6% had invested in developing employee skills, while 19.8% had invested in automation and technology.
– Productivity depends to a large extent on the quality of work organisation. Leaders who structure processes effectively, delegate responsibility and protect their teams from overload create the conditions for sustainable productivity growth – says Paweł Prociak, Managing Director at Wyser Executive Search.
Soft skills help sustain performance
The European Working Conditions Survey 2024, published by Eurofound in April 2026, found that managers were among the occupational groups experiencing the highest levels of work intensity.
With such heavy workloads and significant time pressure, soft skills become particularly important. Communication, trust-building, resilience and empathy help leaders explain the rationale behind decisions, maintain organisational coherence and engage people in implementing change.
Empathy and attentiveness also help managers distinguish between reactions caused by overload or a lack of information and substantive concerns raised by employees with the deepest knowledge of a particular process. Resilience, meanwhile, helps leaders maintain the quality of both decision-making and communication under pressure.
The value of these skills becomes particularly evident when demands begin to exceed a team’s capacity. Gi Group Holding data show that 46.4% of employees in managerial positions have experienced an increase in expectations regarding the pace and efficiency of their work, while 47.8% say they feel overloaded with responsibilities.
An overloaded manager is more likely to operate reactively, spend less time analysing decisions and transfer pressure to the team through sudden changes in assignments and expectations of constant availability.
– High expectations are a natural part of managerial roles. The problem begins when everything becomes urgent and new priorities do not replace previous commitments. In such circumstances, the leader starts operating reactively and transfers the same way of working to the team. Leaders are responsible not only for results, but also for the conditions in which those results are achieved: workload distribution, realistic deadlines, the ability to flag risks and decisions to stop activities that are no longer relevant. Prolonged overload reduces the quality of decision-making and weakens people’s willingness to take responsibility – says Paweł Prociak.
Leadership development does not always keep pace with changing roles
In many companies, promotions are still based primarily on expertise, performance and knowledge of the organisation. However, being promoted because of subject-matter expertise does not automatically prepare someone for a role in which results are delivered through the decisions and work of other people.
A newly promoted manager becomes responsible for delegation, cross-functional cooperation, employee development and guiding teams through change. If the manager continues to take on the most difficult tasks personally and keeps decisions concentrated at their own level, the team’s autonomy is reduced and the manager can quickly become overloaded.
The changing competency profile is also reflected in the World Economic Forum’s The Future of Jobs Report 2025. Compared with the 2023 edition, the largest increase in the share of employers considering a skill to be a core competency was recorded for leadership and social influence, up by 22 percentage points.
The importance of resilience, flexibility and agility increased by 17 percentage points, as did skills related to AI and big data. Although the study covers the broader labour market, its findings point in the same direction as the changes visible in executive roles: technology and analytical capabilities must be combined with influence, adaptability and the ability to work effectively with people.
The leader of the future: less controller, more integrator
These developments are shaping a new type of leader who combines business, technology and organisational perspectives. Their role is to align different areas of the company around a common direction, delegate responsibility and build an organisation capable of operating effectively without concentrating every decision at the highest levels of management.
– Companies are looking for leaders who understand the dependencies between different functions and can translate strategy into the way the entire organisation operates. Knowledge of technology and data must be combined with the ability to unlock the knowledge and initiative of people. Such a manager clearly defines the direction and boundaries of responsibility without keeping every decision at their own level. Their role is to build an organisation capable of responding to change without losing momentum or coherence – concludes Małgorzata Sułkowska, Partner at Wyser Executive Search.
