THE NEW DEFINITION OF INFLUENCE
Theoretically, this year could be one of the last in which AI is not explicitly named among the forces shaping Monitor’s Most Influential list.
While technical expertise certainly remains essential, being among the most influential people in equipment finance has always required more than just having the right answers; and as AI makes more of those answers easier to access, that distinction may become even more important.
The World Economic Forum’s “Future of Jobs Report 2025” offers an early indication of how the value of different skills is shifting across the workforce. Analytical thinking remained employers’ top core skill for the third consecutive year, while resilience, flexibility and agility ranked second and leadership and social influence ranked third. Perhaps more tellingly, both of those human-centered capabilities, along with AI and big data, were among the skills that grew most in importance between the 2023 and 2025 reports.1
The picture that emerges is not one in which technical skills replace human ones, or vice versa. Leaders will increasingly need both. AI may expand access to information, analysis and technical knowledge, but people will still be responsible for deciding what matters, exercising judgment when the path forward is unclear, taking ownership of difficult decisions, earning trust, developing talent and shaping the culture around them.
To explore what the imminent AI-enabled future could mean for leadership and influence in equipment finance, I spoke with three STRIPES graduates and two current participants who are also being recognized in this year’s Most Influential issue. Their experiences and conclusions considered alongside emerging research on AI and leadership, point to a future in which influence may depend less on having all the answers and more on knowing what to do with them.
WHEN EVERYONE HAS THE ANSWERS, JUDGMENT MATTERS MORE
While AI can help with managing work, such as analyzing information or building presentations, Derek Porter, head of public finance at DLL, says it’s not a substitute for true leadership.
“Leadership was never really about being the person who knew the most or produced the best work. It’s about understanding people, knowing when to challenge them and when to support them, creating accountability, and getting a group of people moving in the same direction,” he says. “AI can give you an answer, but it does not own the answer. Somebody still has to exercise judgment, make the decision and at the end of the day be accountable for the execution — that’s leadership.”
That responsibility is also at the center of McKinsey & Company’s examination of leadership in the age of AI. The firm identifies judgment — particularly the ability to align decisions with values and consider the interests of employees, boards, investors, business partners and other stakeholders — as one area in which human leadership will remain especially important.2
Emerging research suggests there may be another challenge in leaders’ decision-making: The more leaders rely on AI to do their thinking, the more deliberate they may need to be about protecting their own ability to think independently.
A Harvard Business Review article, “AI Is Undermining Leaders’ Judgment. Here’s What to Do About It,” argues that as organizations become more reliant on AI, leaders risk losing “original judgment,” which it defines as “the uniquely human capacity to see beyond the dominant narrative and make choices that represent your values under uncertainty.”3
The article points to research showing a negative relationship between frequent AI use and critical thinking, largely because of cognitive offloading.
For leaders, the authors argue, two capabilities are particularly important to preserve: breadth of perception, or the ability to consider multiple dimensions of a situation, and independence of interpretation, or the ability to consider conclusions that differ from the past.
When many people rely on similar systems, data and models, organizations risk becoming increasingly efficient at reinforcing the same assumptions. The authors argue that the answer is not to reject AI, but to deliberately preserve the behaviors that lead to independent judgment: seeking perspectives from the edges, examining disparate signals, resisting premature consensus and considering alternative interpretations before reaching a decision.
Jenny Jarose, vice president of human resources and administration at LTi Technology Solutions, has learned that judgment is a critical part of leadership and influence.
“Early on, I thought being good at HR meant knowing the policies, the compliance requirements, the technical mechanics of the job — and that’s foundational, but it’s not what actually moves people. What I’ve come to understand is that leadership is really about judgment: knowing what to say when there’s no perfect answer yet and having the discipline to be honest even when it’s uncomfortable.”
For Jarose, some of the most consequential leadership moments have required resisting the instinct to immediately produce an answer.
“My instinct as an HR leader is to fix things and have the answer ready,” she says. “But some of the most important moments this year required me to be honest that we didn’t have it all figured out yet and to lead people through that discomfort rather than around it.”
In that sense, AI may make good judgment more valuable, not less. It can provide leaders with more information and suggest a course of action, but leaders still have to determine whether that answer fits the situation, challenges conventional assumptions or deserves to be questioned.
INFLUENCE IS THE ABILITY TO MOVE PEOPLE
Good judgment, however, is only one part of leadership. Having the smartest strategy and getting people to believe in and execute it are completely different capabilities.
McKinsey identifies another important human leadership responsibility: creating aspiration and enrolling other people in it.2 Leaders do more than articulate where an organization should go. They have to understand how people respond to change, recognize resistance and uncertainty, communicate meaning and turn an organizational objective into something others are willing to own.
AI may help build the strategy. It cannot independently create commitment to it.
Lilian Starr, director of servicing operations at First Citizens Bank, points to what STRIPES calls engagement conversations as one tool leaders can use to create commitment around a shared vision.
“Engagement conversations are not simply about communication or gaining agreement,” Starr says. “They are about fostering genuine commitment, building trust and helping people connect their contributions to a larger purpose.”
When people feel heard, valued and connected, she says, they are more likely to “take ownership, contribute ideas, collaborate effectively and invest themselves in shared goals.”
Jarose emphasizes the growth she has seen in her communication. “STRIPES sharpened my ability to lead change intentionally rather than reactively. Working through frameworks like the Golden Circle and thinking critically about organizational ‘why’ — especially through my capstone, which is focused on helping LTi rediscover its own why post acquisition — gave me language and structure for something I was already sensing instinctively. It’s shown up directly in how I lead now: I’m much more deliberate about connecting the day-to-day work back to pur- pose, rather than assuming people will find that connection on their own.”
That distinction may become increasingly important as AI raises the baseline for what an individual can produce. If more people can rapidly access information, prepare recommendations and create polished work, individual output alone becomes less differ- entiating. As AI becomes more embedded in how work gets done, connecting day-to-day work to a larger purpose may become a more important leadership responsibility. The ability to build trust, develop others and create coordinated action becomes more consequential.
For Jarose, influence is felt as much as it is observed. “The people who become influential are the ones who make others feel steadier, not just smarter,” she says.
“I believe knowledge earns you credibility and a seat at the table, but leadership is what makes your voice matter,” Jake Nguyen, vice president and credit manager at Wintrust Specialty Finance, says. “True influence comes from turning that expertise into trust, trust into meaningful relationships and those relationships into lasting impact that moves people, organizations and the industry forward.”
Trust also comes with establishing clarity.
“Knowing the most and failing to execute is a highway to nowhere,” says Porter. “You have to know your assignment, be crystal clear on what success looks like, and remember that it takes a village.”
THE LEADERS WHO THRIVE WILL BE LEARNERS, NOT EXPERTS
One challenge in defining the future of leadership is that AI’s impact is still unfolding. A 2025 structured review of leadership competencies in the AI era found that researchers still do not fully understand which capabilities will ultimately prove most important as AI becomes more embedded in organizational decision-making.4 At the same time, executives are under considerable pressure to figure it out quickly.
A Harris Poll cited by Fortune found that 79% of U.S. CEOs believed they could lose their jobs within two years if they failed to generate measurable business gains from AI.5 That creates a difficult leadership environment: Organizations are being pushed to act decisively on a technology whose implications are still evolving.
Harvard Business School professor Joseph B. Fuller argues that this environment calls for a leader who behaves less like a general executing a known battle plan and more like a scientist — someone willing to experiment, learn and resist making premature decisions for the sake of demonstrating progress.5
Giving employees access to AI or training them to use it does not necessarily trans- form an organization. The larger opportunity comes when leaders are willing to rethink how work itself gets done.5
That requires something different from expertise. It requires experimentation, adaptability and the willingness to admit that yesterday’s answer may no longer apply.
“Growth rarely happens within our comfort zone,” Starr says. “Some of the experiences that contribute most to our development are the ones that initially feel unfamiliar or challenging.”
The most valuable leaders in an AI-driven environment, then, may not be those who claim to have mastered every emerging tool. They may be those most capable of learning as the tools — and the organizations around them — continue to change.
WHAT WE CANNOT AFFORD TO OUTSOURCE
“The leaders who matter most going forward will be the ones who can do what AI can’t: read a room, hold a boundary and make people feel like they’re being led by someone, not something,” Jarose says.
That creates an important paradox.
The more cognitive work AI allows people to outsource, the more intentional leaders may need to become about developing the capabilities that can only be strengthened through practice.
Judgment comes from making decisions. Self-awareness develops through reflection and feedback. Communication improves through difficult conversations. Trust is built through relationships.
For Porter, experience and in-person interactions have played a particularly important role.
“Experience and being in the room have been some of the biggest factors in my development,” Porter says. “When it comes to developing judgment, self-awareness and leadership skills, there is no real substitute for face-to-face interaction. Many of the most valuable lessons come from observing others, having informal conversations and learning alongside experienced colleagues in person.”
Research on leadership development suggests a similar emphasis on interaction and application. An analysis of Training Hall of Fame organizations found that strong leadership development programs increasingly combine technology with executive sponsorship, peer learning, coaching and direct alignment with business strategy.6 Their effectiveness is measured not by whether someone completes training, but by whether development translates into career progression, engagement, retention and leadership impact.
That may become particularly consequential as AI reshapes the early experiences through which leaders have traditionally developed.
“STRIPES provided the structure, reflection and peer learning that helped me become much more intentional in applying these concepts as a leader,” Starr says.
Jim Wall, director of sales, healthcare, at PEAC Solutions, echoes Starr’s point that STRIPES created space to step back and develop intentionally as a leader. He credits the program with helping him define his leadership stand, strengthen his self-awareness and become a more attentive listener. Wall also identifies conflict management as an area he has intentionally developed, approaching difficult conversations directly, with tact and empathy, so people leave with clarity around the decision and path forward.
If technology can produce the first draft, analyze the spreadsheet, recommend the strategy or answer the technical question, organizations gain efficiency. But they also have to consider where emerging leaders will get the experiences that teach them to wrestle with uncertainty, make mistakes, receive feedback, observe senior leaders and develop their own point of view.
The question, then, is not only: What work should we give to AI? It is also: What human capabilities do we risk failing to develop when we do?
“Technical training does not prepare you to make decisions with incomplete information, navigate challenging internal and external discussions and learn from successes and failures,” Wall says. “Self-awareness is created by receiving feedback and identifying blind spots. These are the experiences that build who you are as a leader and your character.”
Jarose shares that concern: “The experiences that shaped me most were the ones with no clear right answer — sitting with a difficult personnel decision, leading people through change I didn’t fully control, having to communicate something hard without knowing exactly how it would land,” she says.
As AI absorbs more routine work, she says, younger professionals will need to be deliberately given “those harder, messier developmental experiences early” so they still have opportunities to develop judgment.
“I don’t see the future as AI versus humans,” Starr says. “I see it as AI and humans working together, with leadership serving as the bridge that ensures both are leveraged in ways that create value, build trust and drive meaningful results.”
THE MOST INFLUENTIAL LEADERS ARE STILL BEING MADE
The STRIPES leaders recognized in this year’s Most Influential issue have built influence in different ways and at different stages of their careers. Yet their experiences suggest that influence is rarely the product of knowledge alone.
It is built through judgment and execution. Through the ability to communicate an idea in a way that makes other people want to participate in it. Through relationships, self-awareness, resilience and a willingness to keep learning when the answer is not obvious.
Those qualities have always mattered in leadership. AI may simply make their value harder to ignore. If the industry is serious about developing leaders for an AI-enabled future, leadership development will need to create opportunities to practice the capabilities technology cannot replicate — making difficult decisions, receiving feedback, reflecting honestly, learning from peers, communicating through uncertainty and turning ideas into action.
In many ways, that is the kind of development STRIPES is designed to provide. Coaching, peer learning, self-reflection and the application of leadership concepts to real business challenges give participants repeated opportunities to practice and refine the human leadership capabilities that will become increasingly important alongside AI.
Starr may offer the clearest summary: “Ultimately, success is measured by what you accomplish. Influence is measured by the positive impact you have on others and the legacy you leave behind through the people, teams and organizations you’ve helped grow.” •
1“The Future of Jobs Report 2025,” World Economic Forum, Jan. 7, 2025.
2“Building Leaders in the Age of AI,” McKinsey & Company, Jan. 12, 2026.
3 “AI Is Undermining Leaders’ Judgment. Here’s What to Do About It,” Harvard Business Review, Aug. 19, 2026.
4Bock, T., & von der Oelsnitz, D., “Leadership-competences in the era of artificial intelligence — a structured review,” Strategy & Leadership, Feb. 28, 2025.
5Nolan, B. “The AI era has a message for every CEO: Adapt or die,” Fortune, March 25, 2026.
6Freifeld, L., “A High-Level Lens for Leadership,” Training, May 5, 2026.
