Leadership
February 24, 2026
The paths of organizational sustainability
Leadership and adaptation culture in generative AI environments
The rapid evolution of generative artificial intelligence has marked an inflection point in how organizations operate, compete, and reinvent themselves. It is no longer a matter of debating whether AI “has arrived” or “will arrive,” but of understanding how its adoption modifies work practices, human relationships, and the central role of leadership in guiding adaptive processes.
Ladmir Carvalho, CEO of Alterdata Software, brings this question in his lecture about valuable insights seen at NRF (National Retail Federation), the largest international retail fair in the world. For him, organizational culture and leadership are determining elements for organizations not only to survive but to thrive in a context of continuous changes accelerated by AI.
One of the central points highlighted by Ladmir is that generative AI drives a series of transformations that are already happening in the present, not in a distant future. This technology is not just another technological resource: it redesigns functions, accelerates decision-making processes, and redefines human performance expectations.
In this scenario, leaders are challenged to promote continuous transformations, helping teams to permanently rethink their work methods and integrate technologies that alter the pace, processes, and connections between people and machines.
Ladmir’s speech shows that artificial intelligence has ceased to be a theoretical abstraction to consolidate itself as a concrete reality, already incorporated into contemporary markets and work models. In this context, intelligent agents emerge as mechanisms capable of assuming activities previously performed manually, redefining flows, roles, and processes.
However, for this transition to occur effectively and sustainably, it is essential that organizations cultivate a strong, cohesive, and learning-oriented culture, capable of integrating these agents into routines without fragmenting teams, generating internal resistance, or compromising collective engagement.
Strategic thinking
This perspective finds an echo in the concept developed by Josh Bersin, who describes the emergence of the superworker, a professional who combines deep human competencies with digital skills, especially in the use of generative AI.
For the author, an organization that wishes to thrive in the digital context must develop workers who not only operate with AI but are capable of strategically thinking about its use, interpreting outputs from generative models, and contextualizing them in business decisions. This requires leadership that understands the capabilities of AI and creates conditions for its teams to assimilate these technologies creatively and collaboratively.
A culture of adaptation is one that does not resist change, but incorporates it as part of the organizational routine. In this context, Ladmir Carvalho emphasizes that organizations that fail to reinvent themselves often succumb to their own rigid standards, citing examples such as Blockbuster and Nokia, which failed to recognize technological shifts and lost relevance.
Leadership cannot be limited to adopting technological tools. It is necessary to reimagine processes, restructure roles and responsibilities and, above all, mobilize people to think differently about the problems they face, bringing technology closer to concrete solutions for market challenges.
Many organizations still make the mistake of applying emerging technologies to reproduce mental models and structures of the past, without recognizing that contemporary challenges demand new organizational logics and distinct ways of thinking and acting. This mismatch reveals a leadership that has not assimilated the necessary cultural transformations: by clinging to obsolete practices or failing to build a shared vision, these leaders end up restricting the organization’s adaptive capacity, fueling internal resistance, and generating frictions that erode the business’s competitiveness and sustainability.
In this new paradigm, leadership needs to be:
- Articulator of the strategic vision, translating external signals (such as changes in consumer behavior or business models) into internal strategies;
- Team facilitator, promoting continuous development programs, such as training in generative AI, agile methods, and human-machine integration;
- Strengthening the culture, cultivating organizational values that encourage experimentation, tolerance for calculated error, and continuous learning;
- Agent of technological and human integration, ensuring that AI is not a substitute, but a complement to human capabilities.
The adaptation culture, therefore, is not just a metaphor. It is a practical approach that articulates leadership, strategy, and technology in an integrated way. It assumes that senior leadership actively engages in the transformation, creating mechanisms for continuous learning, encouraging teams to question established routines, and fostering the critical and contextualized use of AI.
Leadership, in this sense, must not only guide and control, but also inspire, learn, and co-create solutions with teams, abandoning prescriptive discourses in favor of experimental practices. And this statement finds strength in Jeff Bezos’s words, who mentions that there is a type of employee that can never be replaced by AI: one with a high capacity to invent. Bezos values this ability above even traditional knowledge or experience, noting that inventiveness is vital for maintaining creativity and innovation in modern companies.
In summary, the integration of generative AI in modern organizations will not be successful if leadership does not promote a culture of adaptation that:
- Incentive continuous learning and the development of hybrid skills (human and digital);
- Reorient processes and roles to accommodate intelligent agents as work partners;
- Foster a environment that values creativity, experimentation, and strategic alignment between technology and business objectives.
Leadership, therefore, emerges not only as a facilitator of digital transformation but as the main integrating element of organizational culture in the context of generative AI, capable of translating technological potential into sustainable competitive advantage.
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Who wrote this column
Denise de Moura
