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Talent Trends 2026: Human–AI Power Couple
How AI is Changing the Leadership Pipeline
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Companies are shifting how they sway client and customer decisions. Is it working?
INFLUENCED!
By Russell Pearlman / Photo Illustrations by Tim Ames
Talent Trends
2026: Human–AI
Power Couple
How AI is Changing the Leadership Pipeline
That desire to win over stakeholders has led to a burst of creativity among business leaders and organizations. So-called B2B leaders in tech and manufacturing are moving away from traditional, overly scripted sales presentations at major trade shows or in-house corporate events. Instead, they hand the stage over to independent creators who have built credibility through rigorous, unbiased testing. Other organizations have created advisory boards made up of their own customers, letting clients network with one another to share stories. Organizations leverage their most influential existing customers, giving them early access to new products, chats with executives, and posh events. In return, the customers produce videos or chats about their experiences with their own networks.
Perhaps the biggest effort to influence people has been companies moving into streaming video. Multiple companies have routed their marketing dollars away from traditional advertisements and into short, slickly produced YouTube and TikTok videos showing clients using their products. The payment processing firm Square, for instance, has dozens of videos featuring mostly young entrepreneurs discussing how they solved common business challenges, like turning a side hustle into a full-time business, opening a store, or handling expenses. Square has also produced a collection called “Small Businesses Doing Cool Sh*t”. Other companies, instead of producing videos themselves, collaborate with well-established YouTube or TikTok creators. For its part, Pfizer hired Kimberly Hilton, a chemistry professor known to her more than 1.5 million TikTok followers as “Chemical Kim,” to translate complex science into digestible short-form videos. Instead of pushing Pfizer’s products, the videos focus on explaining facts and dispelling myths. “Pfizer reached out to me and said, ‘We don’t want you to advertise Pfizer. We just want to support science education,’” says Hilton, who has also served as a keynote speaker at some Pfizer events.
Attempts at influencing are showing up on platforms even as routine as quarterly earnings calls. Instead of just talking about its revenues and expenses, one tech firm turned its quarterly conference call into a filmed live podcast. The CEO, dressed in all black, interviewed two of his firm’s top clients. Other CEOs have, on earnings day, posted a selfiestyle video on TikTok or written a LinkedIn article translating the results for employees and customers. “Firms are looking for more ways to enhance the authenticity and interactivity of calls,” says Joe Griesedieck, Korn Ferry’s managing director of board and CEO services.
Coming off as inauthentic may be the biggest hazard. Experts say many organizations put the priority on maximizing how many people see the message rather than the quality of the message or value of the messenger. An influencer could have millions of followers, but if they can’t explain a complex subject well, they’re counterproductive. It can be a particular problem for firms trying to influence highly trained academics or researchers, says Shane Hanlon, who runs C&EN BrandLab, a marketing agency. “Scientists will quickly vet who’s legit and who’s not,” he says. The result: broken trust.
That’s why Nichols, in her podcasts, tries to position herself as a secondary focus. Yes, she’s the host, but she says she gains more credibility elevating other people’s successes than touting her own or her company’s. “I hope I can help elevate other people’s personal brands,” she says, in turn solidifying her firm’s professional relationship with them. “What goes around comes around.”
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t’s part of Lisa Nichols’s weekly work schedule. Each Tuesday, she sits down in her home office, turns on her high-definition camera, adjusts her studio-quality microphone, and begins recording her podcast, Something Extra. Nichols often uses the hour-long show to highlight someone who has endured a tough situation and succeeded, or brings on a like-minded person who also believes in living—and leading—with purpose. Right before Memorial Day this year she had a former National Hockey League player on to explain the power of “failing forward.” The week before, she invited a business coach for a conversation about building a legacy. And earlier in 2026 she welcomed an Army veteran turned financial advisor to talk about humility and resilience.
At first glance, these matters don’t have much to do with Nichols’s actual job as CEO of Technology Partners, a St. Louis-based firm placing IT specialists in organizations around the country for temporary assignments. Indeed, technology only rarely features as a main topic. But Nichols sees the podcast, which she started right after the pandemic, as an essential tool to influence people to hire Technology Partners. Sometimes the guests are current clients, sometimes they’re former clients, and sometimes they’re people she’d love to have as clients. The conversations, Nichols says, don’t need to be a hard sell about staffing issues or tech problems. They just need to help convince listeners that they can trust her and, by extension, her firm. “It’s all about the guests telling their stories, and in so doing, getting to know who I am,” she says.
It’s all about the guests telling their stories, and
in so doing, getting to
know who I am.
YouTube and TikTok videos, brand ambassadorships,
and golf tournament sponsorships.
“
Influencer
marketing
Modern audiences do not merely tolerate expert-led content, they actively seek
it out.
“
Not all firms have caught up
with how clients and customers are making purchase decisions.
The
Problem
Competitors can steal business with savvy influencing efforts.
Why it
Matters
Use podcasts, conferences,
and even earnings calls to
indirectly sway business.
The
Solution
Influencing has been an important component of business as long as there’ve been multiple sellers hawking the same goods. Even in medieval times, a blacksmith had to convince customers that the arms and armor he was making were better than his rival’s. Interestingly, celebrity endorsements are centuries old, too. In 1765, potter Josiah Wedgwood crafted a set of cream-colored earthenware for Queen Charlotte, who was so pleased with the result that she gave permission to the craftsman to call himself “Potter to Her Majesty” and call future sets he sold to others “Queen’s Ware.” Fast-forward, and the emergence of mass media turned influencing, which had been mostly done through word of mouth or newspaper advertisements, into a major industry unto itself. National magazines, radio, and television allowed firms to create distinct personas to forge emotional connections with consumers. Technological advances also let businesses expand their face-to-face influencing. CEOs could rally a sales force of hundreds at a corporate retreat, or travel across the country to woo new clients in person. While the mediums might have varied, the onus was on the influencer to “sell” a product or service.
These days, influencing has become considerably tougher. For one thing, there’s a lot more competition for a person’s attention. In 2000, the average American was exposed to roughly 3,000 brand impressions each day. Today, thanks to streaming services, blogs, podcasts, internet banner ads, and social media, we’re exposed to an estimated 10,000 daily. That’s a problem for anyone trying to make an impact, since research shows that humans actively notice fewer than 100 of those daily marketing salvos. Even if more ads and events are registered, they’re not necessary for many consumers to learn about a product’s specs and pricing— that’s what the internet is for.
Business clients have changed, too. Most of them can no longer be won over by a brochure over a two-martini lunch and a round of golf. “If you’re still clinging to marketing strategies from years ago, you’re not just behind—you’re invisible,” Christopher Tompkins, CEO of The Go! Agency, has written. The fragmentation and saturation challenges haven’t changed the fact that people—whether they are customers or clients—want to listen. “Employees, investors, customers, regulators, and partners all expect direct access to leadership,” says Maxim Atanassov, managing partner of Future Ventures, a consultancy helping small and midsize businesses grow. Indeed, more than anything else, experts say, these stakeholders are looking to be convinced that their suppliers, brands, and employers are trustworthy and authentic in a world where precious little seems to be either.
If you're still clinging to marketing
strategies from years ago, you’re not
just behind—you’re invisible.
“
Executives and organizations have plenty on their plates right now. There’s geopolitical turmoil that has thrown global commerce for a loop. The growth prospects for many industries are cloudy at best. Then there’s that whole AI thing—trying to figure out what it’ll do to an organization is a massive time sink. Two decades ago, customers, investors, employees, suppliers, and everyone else would consider leaders spending time on a podcast, writing blogs on LinkedIn, publishing a magazine, hosting a webinar, or organizing a golf tournament a waste of time, if not a dereliction of duty. Want to win a customer’s business? Buy a TV advertisement or start cold calling.
But increasingly, organizations are baking these no-sell events into their daily routines as essential channels to influence customers. In doing so, they are recognizing that both clients and customers, whether they’re making multimillion-dollar decisions or picking up a T-shirt, have changed—and keep changing—how they make purchase decisions. In today’s world, for example, most buyers no longer want to be sold to. They want to be educated—aka influenced—by someone they trust. A lot of these influencing attempts, like Nichols’s podcast, highlight a business leader, but many others highlight a customer solving a problem. A firm might partner with a YouTube creator, having the telegenic video maker talk about an issue the firm solves (mentioning the partner in the video, of course). It’s also why many organizations are spending more on conferences whose audience is their own employees. Get the employees engaged, or so the thinking goes, and you’ll get them to get customers more engaged.
A History of Hawking
The Influencing Economy
SPONSORED RESEARCH
CORPORATE CONTENT
BUSINESS-LEADERSHIP BOOKS
By some estimates, organizations are spending more than $90 billion annually to come across as trustworthy and authentic.
Funding university labs and other outside groups to investigate a topic.
Blogs, TED Talks,
webinars, podcasts,
and firm-sponsored presentations.
Messaging that says, “I’m successful so you can trust me.”
$30+ BILLION
$30 BILLION
$15-20 BILLION
$12-15 BILLION
32B
28B
24B
20B
16B
12B
8B
4B
Getting Creative
Swaying Decisions, but Taking Risks
Scientists will
quickly vet
who is legit and
who is not.
“
Brainy/Nerdy Subject -Matter Experts
Data scientists. Industrial engineers. Salespeople. Who needs celebrities when businesses can train in-house talent to be influencers?
2020s
Athletes
Top sports stars like Michael Jordan not
only pitched products
but helped design them.
1980s-2000s
Hollywood Stars
Bob Hope, Lucille Ball,
and Ronald Reagan—
they all had brand deals.
Actors and actresses became the nation’s premier influencers.
1940s-1950s
Fictional and Non-Fictional Archetypes
Celebrities were few
and far between, so businesses invented spokespeople like
Betty Crocker.
1920s–1930s
Getting a recommendation from a trusted figure is a strategy businesses have used for centuries.
But over the last 100 years, the trusted figure has changed multiple times.
Shifting Trust: which Influencers Work? – a timeline
MicroInfluencers
Having 10 million
YouTube subscribers
was great, but organizations found they could build trust
by targeting smaller,
highly specialized audiences.
2010s
Mommy Bloggers
As internet access proliferated, parents began sharing un-
filtered stories about raising kids, household management, and consumer products.
2000s
I
There’s no one source tracking all these thought-leadership, market-influencing, and branded-content efforts. But looking at data from a variety of sources, it’s clear that companies are spending no less than $90 billion a year on influencing. The stakes in the influencing business are high, as just one ill-received blog post or poor-quality video could make a laughingstock out of a company or leader. Nevertheless, in a world where customers—both business and retail—can get information from anywhere, these influencing efforts are seen as one of the most effective ways to build trust between a buyer and a seller. “Modern audiences do not merely tolerate expert-led content, they actively seek it out,” says Agata Krowinska, a lecturer at Edinburgh Napier University who studies the phenomenon.
The challenge, experts say, is that all these creative influencing attempts can go wrong in a hurry. The most common mistakes happen when a company makes its case with jargon and overt sales pitches. The moment you cross the line and start trying to put corporate marketing through an influencer’s network, you have failed, says Tim Hughes, coauthor of Social Selling: Techniques to Influence Buyers and Changemakers. That influencer can be the CEO, too. This spring, a bank CEO tried to win over skeptical stakeholders by saying that AI would allow his organization to replace “lower-value human capital,” aka 15 percent of the firm’s workforce. The remark sparked a backlash inside and outside the firm, forcing an apology from the CEO.
There’s enough research on all these efforts to give organizations confidence that influencing attempts can work. For one, influencers hold impressive sway over younger people. Indeed, 54 percent of Gen-Z consumers say they have purchased products promoted by social-media influencers, compared to only 21 percent who say they’ve been influenced by traditional advertisements, according to a 2025 study from the International Journal on Science and Technology. Atanassov, the consultant, devised an influencing strategy for a Calgary-based oil company to help raise about $3 million to expand its business: The CEO starred in a series of YouTube videos and penned LinkedIn posts geared toward communicating the company’s strategy and perspective. In the end, the firm met its funding goal in just two weeks. “It was just a matter of collecting checks,” Atanassov says.