Services · AI leadership
Executive search for the leaders of AI
AI leadership is our fastest-growing client request. Every industry, people analytics, fintech, enterprise SaaS, IoT, is being remade by machine intelligence, and success depends on leaders who have built with it. We identify and hire the executives driving AI, machine learning and data-driven transformation, for companies from venture stage to enterprise.
76%
of 2,000 large-enterprise CEOs surveyed by IBM report a Chief AI Officer, up from 26% a year earlier →
695
directors across 56 countries told Deloitte's Global Boardroom Program AI is now a board-level agenda item →
3,000+
C-suite, specialist and board placements since 2001, increasingly at the intersection of AI and scale →
For organisations that are not AI-native
AI is the dominant opportunity, and the dominant concern, for most organisations that are not pure-play technology companies, and for many technology companies that are not yet AI-native. The leadership problem is the same in both: who in the executive stack owns the capability, and who has built with it before.
We have done significant work in AI strategy, product and executive leadership for companies including Xero, Culture Amp and MYOB, organisations working out how to take advantage of adjacent opportunities and product development with AI, alongside engagements helping companies and consulting groups build innovative DNA into their executive talent stacks.
Our market read runs on the same standard we hold for leaders: real intelligence, as opposed to artificial. Observed market actions, aggregate trends and documented engagements sit behind every decision.
Where we have done it
We partnered with Culture Amp as it scaled AI-driven people analytics, placed AI product leadership at MYOB, and supported Xero through its AI-enabled platform evolution, alongside AI strategy, product and engineering mandates across four regions. Real intelligence about artificial intelligence: our reads come from live market signals, not conference decks.
Inside AI leadership
The seats and the questions inside this practice, each on its own page with the evidence behind it.
AI leadership
AI Governance & Board Renewal
Board search for the AI era: chairs, non-executive directors and advisory structures with the AI-governance capability boards did not need five years ago.
AI leadership
Fractional Chief AI Officer
Fractional and interim Chief AI Officers and senior AI operating leaders — for organisations building AI capability before the full-time hire is justified or findable.
AI ventures
AI & Data Leadership
Executive search for data and machine-learning leadership: the analytics, data-platform and ML executives an AI capability is actually built on.
AI ventures
Founding AI Teams
The first executive hires for AI companies: founding commercial, product and engineering leadership for teams building from seed and Series A.
AI ventures
AI Engineering Leadership
Executive search for the engineering leadership behind AI products: heads of engineering, platform and ML leaders for companies building AI into what they ship.
AI ventures
AI Board & Advisory
Board and advisory appointments for companies whose governance now has to cover AI: non-executive directors, chairs and advisory structures.
AI-native ventures, the companies whose product is the model, have their own thematic page: AI ventures →
104.6
Talent Market Index · Hot
Hiring AI leadership? Start with the live read on conditions: the index, sector gauges and the signal wire behind our advice.
Open the observatory →