2026 will be the year AI leadership is defined by governance and influence
As 2026 unfolds, AI shifts from experimental pilots to production scale reality, with Agentic AI leading the charge toward autonomous decision-making. Drawing from AIXC’s executive council, this report compiles insights from data science and AI leaders on the trends shaping enterprise success focusing on deployment realities, strategic orchestration, and human adaptation.
- Agentic AI
Agentic AI moves beyond hype into real-world orchestration, demanding robust knowledge foundations and production stability.
“In 2026, AI will continue its mainstream acceleration, driven by the rise of autonomous and semi-autonomous agent orchestration. The real challenge for leaders will be prioritizing the highest-value opportunities and investing in agents that deliver measurable business outcomes. Equally critical is the knowledge foundation behind these systems. Without robust, contextualized enterprise knowledge, agents cannot take accurate actions or produce reliable insights.”
Eddie Rustandi
AVP – Head of Commercial AI Capabilities
Merck
“In 2026, companies will shift from talking about Agentic AI to actually building and deploying it in production. They will learn that getting agents to work in real workflows is far more difficult than it appears. The strongest demand will be for people who can make these systems stable, safe, useful, and cost saving.”
Krishna Mohan Akurathi
Director Retail Consumer Analytics
CVS Health
Above perspectives highlight the transition from concept to execution, where reliability trumps novelty.
- Enterprise AI
Enterprises will orchestrate AI at ecosystem scale, prioritizing governance and leadership to drive self-optimizing operations.
“In 2026, AI will evolve from powering isolated workflows to orchestrating business ecosystems through autonomous, agentic decision platforms, enabling a new era of ‘self-optimizing enterprises’. The real differentiator will not be who adopts AI the fastest, but who does so with deep observability, traceability, and enterprise-grade governance, ensuring every model-driven insight is rooted in trusted data and aligned with responsible AI guardrails. Success will be defined by measurable business outcomes and how intelligently and ethically organizations embed AI into mission-critical operations to unlock sustainable, scalable value across industries.”
Rajesh Sura
Head of Data Engineering & Analytics
Amazon
“In 2026, the defining shift in enterprise AI will be the move from executing isolated AI projects to cultivating true strategic influence across the organization. AI agents, automation, and advanced analytics will only create meaningful value when leaders can align vision, guide cross-functional orchestration, and turn setbacks into strategy resets. The most successful enterprises will be led by sense-making leaders, those who rise above the model, interpret uncertainty with clarity, and unite business strategy with AI capabilities. In this new era, influence, not technology, will be the ultimate differentiator.”
Ling Zhang
Founder and AI & Data Science Strategy Consulting
Grow to Your Fullest
Leaders stress observability and sense-making as keys to turning AI into enduring competitive edges.
- AI in Marketing
Marketing teams must rewire psychology and processes to harness AI’s speed, treating campaigns as perpetual betas.
“The biggest AI challenge in 2026 won’t be the technology — it will be the psychology. AI capability is accelerating exponentially, but most marketing organizations are still operating with mental models built for a world that moved in slow motion. Even the notion of a ‘campaign’—once measured in months—is now a relic in a world where ideas live and die in hours. The gap isn’t in tools; it’s in our ability to unlearn old workflows, collapse linear processes, and reward agility as much as expertise. The leaders who win will treat marketing like a product that’s always in beta: insight, idea, test, iterate, repeat.”
Ash ElDifrawi
Chief Commercial and Brand Officer
TAG – The Aspen Group
This human-centered view underscores agility as the bridge between AI power and marketing impact.
Agentic foundations enable enterprise ecosystems, but governance, influence, and psychological agility will determine 2026 winners.