For the past 25 years, the mission of global business leaders has been relatively simple. It’s about growing existing businesses, allocating capital more efficiently, and deploying technology that increases productivity. However, PwC Global Chairman Mohamed Khande says: luck In Davos, Switzerland, ahead of the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting, he insisted that era is over. Khande argued that the CEO job has changed more in the past year than it has in the past quarter century.
“This is one of the most testing moments for leaders,” Khande said. luck‘s Diane Brady describes a new “trimodal” mandate that requires executives to simultaneously run their businesses today, transform in real time, and build entirely new business models for the future. “I’ve never seen anything like that in 25 years,” he said.
Despite these pressures, Khande’s message to the global business community is rooted in historic optimism. “Don’t be afraid of the future. It’s scary. It’s true. Things change every day, but don’t be afraid,” he said, noting that all of the uncertainties that cause great stress for executives have happened in the past, from tariffs about 100 years ago to the industrial revolution going back even further. “Over time, something good will happen.” Mr. Khande admitted that he is an optimist by nature, but insisted that top leaders can adapt to this business environment.
AI execution gap
Of course, the main driver of this disturbing change is the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence, as revealed in PwC’s 29th Global CEO Survey. To overcome the uncertainties of the AI era, The announcement was made at the beginning of the annual general meeting in Davos. The survey, based on responses from 4,454 CEOs across 95 countries and territories, revealed a clear disconnect between ambition and reality. Khande said the business world will make great strides between 2024 and 2025, going from asking themselves whether they can or should adopt AI to a point where “no one is asking that question anymore. Everyone is going to adopt AI.”
However, according to a PwC survey, only 10-12% of companies report seeing any benefits in terms of revenue or costs, and a whopping 56% say they are seeing no benefits. This reflects an MIT study that shocked the market in August with its finding that 95% of generative AI pilots across the corporate sector fail.
Khande attributed this tension not to the technology itself, but to a lack of fundamental rigor. “For some reason, AI advances so fast that people forget that implementing technology requires going back to basics,” he explained, citing the need for clean data, solid business processes, and governance. PwC finds that companies reaping the benefits of AI are “setting the foundations in place.” He argued that it’s not the technology that matters but the execution, and that it comes down to good management and leadership.
The Paradox of Confidence and America’s Advantage
The uncertain environment is also creating contradictions in business confidence, Kande said. luck. CEOs express confidence in the global economy, but only 30% are confident in their ability to grow their businesses. Khande questioned whether this hesitance was due to geopolitics, tariffs, technology or a lack of leadership agility. He noted that the past 15 years have been an era of solid growth and stable business models, and this time has been a real test for executives. “This is one of the most testing moments for leaders we face today,” he said. Because you need the ability to change quickly and adapt quickly without getting bogged down in day-to-day tactical combat.
PwC’s 29th annual survey found that only three in 10 CEOs are confident in their earnings growth over the next 12 months, down from 38% in 2025 and 56% in 2022, marking the lowest CEO confidence in their earnings outlook in five years. This is despite many leaders continuing to pursue multi-year opportunities to reinvent their businesses through AI, innovation, and cross-sector expansion.
The transformation of the CEO role is also spilling over to employees, forcing them to rethink their career paths. Khande warned that AI is disrupting the traditional “apprenticeship model” in which entry-level employees learn by doing basic tasks. The classic career ladder, which started at an introductory level and taught a lot of expertise through hands-on learning, will now need to be redesigned to teach “systems thinking” rather than task execution, as AI increasingly handles task execution.
After all, Kande advises executives to look at the past 50 to 100 years, not the past five, to understand the current moment. Citing the infrastructure boom of the railroad era and the early internet, he said he believes the current wave of investment will create the next era of innovation. The CEO Survey’s upcoming Decade of Innovation and Industry Consolidation framework supports this long-term view, highlighting that companies that generate more revenue from new areas tend to have higher profit margins and CEO confidence in their future growth.
“I’m an optimist,” Kande concluded. Instead of being afraid of all the changes that are happening, he urged leaders to remember that people fear what they don’t understand, and the best solution to that is to seek understanding. “That’s why I’m spending a lot of time now learning and traveling, just to understand what’s going on and to think about what I could do differently. That’s why I’m not afraid of AI.”
“We’ve seen a change,” Kande said. “You have to accept that.”
