Editor's Note: As China advances the Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30), artificial intelligence is being positioned as a key driver of "new productive forces" and economic transformation. In this context, AI is not only reshaping industries, but also having a growing impact on leadership, talent and the nature of work. To explore these shifts, we invited Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, the chief science officer at Russell Reynolds Associates, a New York-based management consulting firm, to share insights on how AI is transforming leadership, organizational capabilities and labor markets, as well as its broader implications for China and global governance.

Q1 You have argued that AI does not create leadership problems but rather reveals and exposes them. In this context, what does AI tend to reveal first — capability gaps, personality flaws, or structural weaknesses? How do you interpret AI's impact on the nature of leadership, and does this shift require us to fundamentally redefine what effective leadership means?

AI does not create leadership problems; it reveals or exposes them with unusual clarity. What it exposes first depends on the context, but in most cases, it is not raw capability that fails, but judgment that does not differentiate. Many leaders appear competent when decisions are opaque and feedback is slow. AI accelerates both, making poor thinking more visible. This means that AI raises the bar for leadership talent, and many leaders who were good in the past will not be future-fit or future-ready.

AI also surfaces personality risks. Overconfidence, low self-awareness, and poor impulse control become more consequential when leaders can act faster and at greater scale. At the same time, structural weaknesses are harder to hide. If incentives are misaligned or decision rights are unclear, AI simply amplifies the dysfunction.

This does not redefine leadership so much as strip it down to its essence. Effective leadership is less about having answers and more about asking better questions, interpreting ambiguous signals, and exercising sound judgment under uncertainty. AI raises the bar by making superficial competence easier to fake and real expertise harder to ignore.