Technology Leaders Must Level Up Digital Fluency To Thrive

From AI’s rapid diffusion to the promise and hazard of quantum computing, technology leaders are managing compounding shocks with one clear advantage: the ability to combine digital skill, transparent communication and disciplined execution.

In technology markets, the currency of leadership is shifting towards how confidently you can read the digital terrain and quickly deliver results.

As part of our ‘Leading Through Uncertainty’ series, Kate Burns, Chief Operating Officer at Odgers, joins Mike Drew, Head of our Global Technology Practice, to examine what boards and founders should expect from leadership in the next 12–18 months and why speed and precision is the pairing that scales.

Technology Is Not One Industry, It’s Hundreds

The reality for technology executives is that no two subdivisions, markets or product cycles are alike. Cybersecurity, AI and consumer platforms are all incorporated at differing scales and stages.

Success hinges on leaders who can absorb new information at pace and apply it across diverse subsectors. “Get comfortable being uncomfortable. In tech, you’re learning every day and then retelling that story to mobilise people,” commented Mike.

AI Is Both An Accelerant And An Anxiety 

While most people meet AI through consumer models, the transformational impact is unfolding into systemwide efficiency gains that compound over time.

For boards, this presents two leadership imperatives:  

1. Reduce fear through transparency. 
2. Convert optimism into execution.  

Noted Mike: “Boards don’t need to be technical, but rather they need to understand the interaction between business and technology - and how to lead the change.”

Quantum And One Thousand Keys

Quantum computing will amplify the capabilities of AI to unfathomed levels, unlocking problems that existing solutions simply cannot reach. This power, however, introduces risk as encryption could be trivialised, raising profound security concerns.

“If AI is one key for one lock, quantum is a thousand keys opening a thousand locks instantly. The upside is vast but without necessary safeguards, the downside is too,” commented Mike.

Expect early commercial applications in two to four years, alongside heightened policy attention. Leaders should identify opportunity pathways now, while advocating for long term guardrails that protect customers, IP and critical infrastructure.

The Scaling Journey And Healthy Paranoia

“Speed without precision burns fuel, but precision without speed loses the market. The scale journey demands both,” said Mike. Tech is one of the very few market environments where a lean team can rapidly create outsized value.

This brings a distinctive psychology and a healthy paranoia about time-to-market, product-market fit, and forecasting of disruption. Anticipating a market before it is established often becomes part of the scaling journey.

Hero Founder To Foundation Team

The founder’s job of ‘building the rocket’ is naturally quite different to piloting it through the stratosphere. As companies mature, leadership requirements rotate from visionary risk-taking to structure, discipline and financial rigour. Many founders thrive by pivoting into complementary roles as new executives are brought in to orchestrate sustained, long-term growth.  

This model reduces execution risk, strengthens succession options, and improves the board’s visibility on where leadership strengths, as well as gaps, are present.

The New Tech Talent Map

Digital fluency has escaped the confines of ‘tech companies’. Advanced adoption in industrial and financial services means exceptional tech leaders can come from anywhere; and deep tech is pulling hard from academia.  

“The impact of the right hire, particularly those with genuinely scarce capability, can be enterprise defining,” remarked Mike.

Leadership Essentials For Your Board 

1. Level up digital fluency at the top. Fluency in the interaction of business and technology matters more than deep technical detail.  
2. Hire for speed and precision. Prioritise leaders who can balance visionary pace with exacting execution.  
3. Build complementary foundation teams. Architect leadership as a portfolio of strengths to scale structure.  
4. Plan for quantum and its protocols. Identify use cases now and gather early on security.  
5. Lead through trust. Communicate transparently, link mission to personal purpose, and deliver on promises.  

Odgers’ Technology Practice combine deep technology expertise with cross-sector insight to build transformational leadership teams. Our collaborative model joins perspectives to solve complex, three-dimensional problems in executive hiring.

Leading Through Uncertainty

Alongside the everyday demands of their organisations, today's leaders are facing obstacles and challenges on an unprecedented scale.

Our ‘Leading Through Uncertainty’ series explores how senior leaders manage continual complexity, ambiguity and transformation. In a world where change is the only constant, we spotlight the real-world, inspirational stories of leadership in uncertain times.

Explore our ‘Leading Through Uncertainty’ collection here.

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