ICYMI: 2026 CEO Workforce Forum Explores How AI Is Shaping the New World of Work

Here’s what CEOs and other business leaders said during the event:

On Leading the AI-Driven Workforce Transition

• Chuck Robbins, Chair and Chief Executive Officer, Cisco and Business Roundtable Chair: “While technology will reshape work, investing in our people is how we expand opportunity and how we build a stronger economy.”
• Janet Truncale, Global Chair and CEO, EY: “Technology alone does not create value. People do. … AI is only as valuable as the hands that shape it.”
• Shelley Simpson, President and Chief Executive Officer, J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc.: “There’s not one transition that’s happening. We’re not trying to prepare a workforce for an AI change. We’re trying to prepare our workforce for a lifetime of change, for a career of change, because it’s going to look so different five years from now, 10 years from now.”
• Blake Moret, Chairman and CEO, Rockwell Automation: “The innovation spurred by AI will enable us to launch new lines of business. That will allow us to bring more people into the workforce empowered by new technologies.”

On Expanding Economic Mobility in the Age of AI

• Carol Tomé, Chief Executive Officer, UPS: “If you’re a package car driver for us, a seasoned package car driver, you can make $170,000 a year. We’re proud of that, but it doesn’t matter if you start as a part-timer or a package car driver or a machinist or a mechanic or a pilot or an accountant or a technician. At UPS, our philosophy is simple. We want to give you a career opportunity of a lifetime and give you the opportunity to reach your highest potential, whatever that may be.”
• John Furner, President and CEO, Walmart: “About 75% of our managers started as hourly associates. I did that. … Other times you start at Walmart, you may move on to other things. … If you want to write code, if you want to do PhD research, if you want to fly an airplane, drive a truck, or if you want to work as a team lead in your local store, you can do all that in the company.”
• Christophe De Vusser, Worldwide Managing Partner, Bain & Company: “We’re actually increasing our recruiting targets. Young people sit on the best skills nowadays. They don’t just vibe code, they code in the right way. They’re the curious ones. That’s counter to what you read in the press, but we’re excited about it.”

On AI’s Workforce Impact and Understanding the Data

• Joseph Briggs, Economist and Managing Director, Goldman Sachs: “There will be some job displacement, but there’s also just going to be a ton of jobs created at the same time. … The thing that I think we should really focus on is not necessarily thinking about how we can limit the impacts of AI on labor, but how we can create new opportunities.”
• Nela Richardson, Chief Economist, ESG Officer and Head of ADP Research, ADP: “If you really want to capture the productivity of the moment that AI promises, it's really about scaling, re-skilling, redeploying at the task level and not to confuse jobs with actually how work gets done, which is where AI has its greatest promise.”

On Investing in Employees as Technology Evolves

Zoetis CEO Kristin Peck and AT&T Chairman and CEO John Stankey each sat down with an employee to discuss how their companies support learning, skill development and career growth.

• Q: Kristin Peck, Chief Executive Officer, Zoetis, Inc.: “We’re the world leader in AI diagnostics for point of care, but it's also beyond just R&D and new products. … So perhaps you can talk about what that experience has been like, how are you leveraging AI, and importantly, what has been the impact of that on your teams and on your customers?”
• A: Kristin Kasselman, Senior Vice President of U.S. Livestock and Equine, Zoetis, Inc.: “We took a team of cross-functional colleagues, intentionally partnered them with some of our customer-facing colleagues to do two things, identify the pain points in their role, and understand where we could add incremental value to our customers. Together, the teams were able to define and create a business planning tool that was designed to increase efficiency and maximize value for the customers.”

• Q: John Stankey, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, AT&T Inc.: “If a new person comes into your organization and they’re in the position you were in 28 years ago, what are you saying to them or what counsel are you giving them given the environment we’re in now?”
• A: Jared Ridley, Associate Director of Network Process & Quality, AT&T Inc.: “Technology is continually changing and you need to be on the forefront of that. And I promise you that AT&T is going to continue to pour into you as long as you’re willing to put in the effort and invest in yourself.”