The August edition of Northern Insight featured digital and AI transformation, a hot topic currently. What didn't feature though is how we will upskill our leaders to lead in this new AI world.
AI is entering a new era, one defined not just by smarter tools, but by autonomous “agents” able to carry out complex business processes. In April The Work Trend Index Annual Report by Microsoft heralded a new type of workplace: The Frontier Firm. Organisations powered by hybrid human-AI teams, and a new leadership archetypethe agent boss.
Microsoft predicts that this new firm will emerge in three phases. Where are you currently?
Human with assistant: AI boosts individual productivity, speeding up existing workflows.
Human-agent teams: AI acts as a digital colleague, taking on specific tasks, freeing humans for higher-value work.
Human-led, agent-operated: AI autonomously runs processes under broad human direction, reporting back only when necessary.
For organisations and leaders, this presents opportunities and challenges. Hybrid human-AI teams could unlock massive potential in AI’s ability in analysis, automation, and data retrieval. It risks though being caught in a back lash where employees feel displaced or undervalued as AI handles large chunks of ‘their work’.
As humans we dominate in creativity, strategy, and relationship management, but if we create this new hybrid workforce, we need to ensure that our leaders and teams develop skills in collaboration dynamics so we can create workflows and communication styles to integrate AI without creating competition. We need strong governance with clear rules, ethical safeguards, and accountability structures for AI. Who will be the responsible ‘product owner’ in a hybrid team? Human or AI? Surely it must be the human. Personally that risk sends me down a mental rabbit hole of long since read dystopian sci-fi which leaves me in a cold sweat!
Through this we are seeing the emergence of a new type of leader, one with an ‘agent boss’ mindset. A leader who builds, delegates to, and manages AI agent treating them as another team member, a thought partner who can challenge ideas, brainstorm, and extend the capacity of human team members.
Whilst this seems an unlikely place, I remember the mid 1990s, when people were nervous of how the new ‘computers’ would take work away, yet they are now integral to our lives.
This will happen, we just must choose how and recognise this impacts our future resourcing strategies. Some of our workforce will expect AI enhancement in their roles, others will be terrified of it and will need upskilling, many will be wary. We should though integrate AI into our strategies as inaction is a tangible business risk.
Skills for Frontier Leadership
By 2030 the World Economic Forum sees AI & Technology literacy, creative thinking, resilience, lifelong learning, leadership & social influence as the key skills. Above all, we must upskill our leaders for this new age, fusing traditional leadership strengths and AI-specific competencies:
Coaching & building psychological safety: Asking questions, using inclusive “we” language, and building trust remain critical, even with AI teammates.
Critical thinking & Strategy: Decisionmaking, adaptability, ethical judgment, and strategic vision will be essential for directing hybrid human-agent teams.
AI Management Skills: Leaders must define clear role boundaries, optimise the human-agent ratio, refine prompts for better AI output, and measure AI’s impact. Training agent, much like human employee, will be necessary.
This shift to agent-led work isn’t just technology adoption, it’s a fundamental rethinking of how our organisations operate, compete, and grow. The Frontier leaders who can harness human-AI collaboration, govern it responsibly, and adapt as capabilities accelerate will set the pace for the next era of business.
Annabel is an Executive and Team Coach, Leadership Facilitator and Coach Supervisor. You can reach out to Annabel via LinkedIn, annabel@successfultraining.co.uk, or visit www.successfultraining.co.uk