Axios: future-proof leader; Catepillar as AI darling

Posted on May 3, 2026 by michelleclarke2015
Your future-proof leader
 
Illustration of a CEO at a desk in the middle of a computer circuit board
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Stock: Getty Images
 
Axios CEO Jim VandeHei wrote a piece in his Axios C-Suite newsletter (ask to join) to help other CEOs think about how to future-proof themselves during this moment of profound technological change.He wanted to expand it for the Axios AM audience because EVERYONE is staring down this moment together. Whether you’re the CEO or an entry-level hire, we want you to see how a really good leader can approach the AI transition.

Your employer’s job is getting harder, faster, too.

Companies are being redesigned from the top down around AI. The leaders who get it right will look very different from the ones who don’t.

A startup with a handful of people and a team of AI agents might undercut your work at any moment, at a fraction of your cost.

Why it matters: The next 18 months will sort companies into two camps — those with leaders committed to running a genuinely AI-integrated organization, and those that bought a bunch of AI tools and called it transformation.

Here’s what a future-proofed CEO is actually acting on right now:

1. Becoming an AI decision-maker. AI strategy is no longer being handed off to CTOs. Corporate leaders are becoming systems architects. They personally decide where AI agents run workflows end-to-end, where humans stay in the loop and where both work together

Nearly three-quarters of CEOs say they’re now their companies’ chief AI decision-maker, per the consulting firm BCG. Half say their job stability depends on getting it right this year.

2. Reimagining their team. The most important role in any company by 2027 won’t have a clean title. It’s someone who understands AI systems well enough to architect workflows, people well enough to keep talent motivated through the transition, and the business well enough to know what matters.

That’s a hybrid of your current CTO, CHRO and COO.

The companies that find or develop this person first will move at twice the speed of those still routing AI decisions through a committee.

3. Anticipating the politics. The pressure on leaders not to replace workers with AI is already real. The temptation to do so anyway once the tech gets good enough will be real, too.

Klarna learned this the hard way. It cut 700 customer service jobs, watched satisfaction crater and quietly rehired humans after CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski admitted he went too far.

The gap between executive optimism and employee anxiety is a powder keg most organizations haven’t figured out how to defuse.

4. Managing trust issues. Employees fear replacement. Customers fear misuse. Regulators fear concentration. Investors fear wasted spending. That’s a big balancing act to manage.

The companies getting this right aren’t winging it. PwC found that firms with formal responsible AI frameworks are 1.7x more likely to capture real ROI from the tech.

5. Running at dual speed. The planning cycle that matters now requires leaders to think on two time scales simultaneously. Keeping both in sync will be a massive challenge in the years ahead.

There’s a fast clock (weekly and monthly cycles of AI deployment, agent testing, efficiency pushes and product shifts) where companies are trying to move like startups.

And there’s a slow clock (quarterly culture shifts, trust-building, infrastructure investment and talent development) where they’re trying to build something that lasts.

6. Retaining talent. Most companies already anticipate bringing on fewer junior workers in the near term as AI absorbs that work.

That’s rough when seniority amounts to thousands of solved problems, fixed mistakes and navigated crises that accumulated over time. Leaders who shrink the pipeline now are quietly borrowing against the institutional judgment they’ll need later.

The bottom line: The leaders you trust won’t be defined by vision alone. They’ll be the ones who treated AI like a discipline — not a distraction — and stayed honest with you all the way through.📈 If you’re a CEO or on a CEO’s team: Ask to join Jim’s new weekly Axios C-Suite newsletter.
    
 
 
2. The tangible AI economy: Caterpillar as AI darling
 
Caterpillar excavators are unloaded at the Port of Long Beach in January. Photo: Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty ImagesCaterpillar — founded decades before computers and nearly a century before ChatGPT — is becoming an AI play, Axios’ Nathan Bomey writes.

Why it matters: The equipment maker is enjoying a sales boom from the surge in development of AI data centers and power plants.

Between the lines: Much of Caterpillar’s growth in power and energy is driven by data center demand and the electricity needed to support cloud computing and generative AI, CEO Joe Creed said on an earnings call.

Caterpillar makes the engines and turbines that supply both primary and backup power to those facilities, as well as the electrical infrastructure to run them. 

Driving the news: Caterpillar this week recorded a 22% increase in revenue, compared with a year earlier, to $17.4 billion.

That crushed S&P Capital IQ estimates of $16.4 billion.

It included a 38% increase in construction industry revenue and a 22% rise in its power and energy segment.

Caterpillar has accumulated a “record” backlog in orders, Creed said. The backlog totaled $63 billion, up 79% from a year earlier.

The bottom line: The AI economy continues to translate into demand for actual stuff like Nvidia chips and Caterpillar machines.

That’s making it increasingly difficult to argue the AI boom is a mirage.Share this story.
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About michelleclarke2015

Life event that changes all: Horse riding accident in Zimbabwe in 1993, a fractured skull et al including bipolar anxiety, chronic fatigue …. co-morbidities (Nietzche 'He who has the reason why can deal with any how' details my health history from 1993 to date). 17th 2017 August operation for breast cancer (no indications just an appointment came from BreastCheck through the Post). Trinity College Dublin Business Economics and Social Studies (but no degree) 1997-2003; UCD 1997/1998 night classes) essays, projects, writings. Trinity Horizon Programme 1997/98 (Centre for Women Studies Trinity College Dublin/St. Patrick's Foundation (Professor McKeon) EU Horizon funded: research study of 15 women (I was one of this group and it became the cornerstone of my journey to now 2017) over 9 mth period diagnosed with depression and their reintegration into society, with special emphasis on work, arts, further education; Notes from time at Trinity Horizon Project 1997/98; Articles written for Irishhealth.com 2003/2004; St Patricks Foundation monthly lecture notes for a specific period in time; Selection of Poetry including poems written by people I know; Quotations 1998-2017; other writings mainly with theme of social justice under the heading Citizen Journalism Ireland. Letters written to friends about life in Zimbabwe; Family history including Michael Comyn KC, my grandfather, my grandmother's family, the O'Donnellan ffrench Blake-Forsters; Moral wrong: An acrimonious divorce but the real injustice was the Catholic Church granting an annulment – you can read it and make your own judgment, I have mine. Topics I have written about include annual Brain Awareness week, Mashonaland Irish Associataion in Zimbabwe, Suicide (a life sentence to those left behind); Nostalgia: Tara Hill, Co. Meath.
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