Winning with character, not coding

Employers need to focus on character. Skills can be learned. This isn’t a gentle suggestion for the AI era; rather it’s the fundamental reorientation businesses must make to survive it. Whilst the business world obsesses over which AI tools to deploy and which technical skills to hurriedly upskill and teach, they’re missing what matters. 

 

We’re living through the fastest technological shift modern organisations and businesses have ever faced, with AI models improving at breathtaking speed. For example, on the SWE-bench coding benchmark, top AI systems went from solving 4.4% of problems in 2023 to 71.7% in 2024, a gain of 67.3 percentage points in one year (2025 Stanford AI Index).

 

AI agents can now observe, reason, plan, and act. These capabilities will only accelerate, and here’s what no one wants to admit: inside most enterprises, this transformation isn’t happening. It’s stalling, and the reason isn’t technological; it’s human. What we’re witnessing is a ‘readiness gap.’

 

Take what’s happening right now with agentic AI. In regulated environments, agentic systems often perform well in pilots but stall at the point of production. Not because the technology fails, but because organisations haven’t agreed who is accountable when automation needs to be paused, overridden, or questioned. What we are seeing is that leadership teams in many firms are rushing to deploy these systems without the foundations required to support them. Put simply, we’re building Formula 1 engines and placing them into go kart chassis.

 

The technology is powerful, but it’s constrained by fragmented data, brittle systems, and immature governance. The outcome isn’t autonomy; it’s instability and yet this growing divide between what AI can do and what organisations are ready for is where opportunity and risk now sit side by side. It’s important to remember that this ’readiness gap’ is essentially a leadership and operating model issue, and not a shortcoming of employees.

 

Furthermore, AI is reshaping how value within business is created and defined. Tasks which once relied on specialist expertise, for example, are increasingly handled by intelligent systems. Technical skills remain important, but they are no longer the sole measure of value and impact within an organisation. Today, what truly differentiates employees is how they ‘show up’ when AI begins to act.  

 

Employees, for example, who thrive alongside AI are not necessarily the most technical, often they are the individuals who are able to trust automation while staying accountable. These employees typically question outputs thoughtfully rather than reflexively and stay disciplined in imperfect environments, whilst remaining curious even when outcomes are uncertain. Most importantly, they take responsibility when humans and machines succeed together or fail together. These qualities are not learned overnight, as they are expressions of character shaped by workplace environment, leadership, and experience. Character is observable in decisions made under uncertainty, and not in behavioural traits or cultural fit language.

 

Furthermore, there is a growing belief that smarter models will solve today’s AI challenges. However, the next leap forward will be driven by the concept of ‘readiness’. Most businesses today are still catching up on the basics, and in this workplace environment, autonomy does not feel empowering; it feels risky for both senior leadership teams and employees.

 

Agentic systems thrive in environments with strong foundations, where management is intentional, and the architecture needed to support this sea-change is modular and resilient. Importantly, this is where people make all the difference, regardless of the size of the business, as judgment matters. Knowing when to let systems run, when to pause, and when to step in is a human skill.

 

It’s tempting to look for an ‘AI-ready’ personality in business; yet we know that in practice, success has little to do with personality and everything to do with mindset. People who work well with agentic AI tend to share a few similarities; for instance, these employees are naturally curious, feel comfortable navigating uncertainty, value progress over perfection, and hold themselves accountable. A person’s character is the stabilising element during periods of rapid change and evolution.

 

Arguably, AI maturity within organisations is a journey for leadership and management teams, but AI maturity is often framed as a technical roadmap. To be successful with the implementation of agentic AI, organisations need to act with intent and decide how employees and AI will work together. Importantly, these businesses need to invest in people who can operate with judgment and confidence inside new systems where adaptability, accountability, and curiosity are treated as essential capabilities, not soft qualities.

 

So, what should CEOs and HR directors do in the next 12 months?

 

First, stop hiring for skills that will be obsolete in the near future. Instead, start hiring for character, including curiosity, adaptability, integrity, and resilience. These aren’t soft skills; in fact they are the skills that will determine whether your business can actually use the technology you’re buying.

 

Second, audit your leadership team. Not an easy task, but an important one. Which of your senior leaders have demonstrated they can navigate ambiguity? Who’s shown they can learn, unlearn, and relearn? Who has the judgment to know when to trust AI and when to override it? If the answer is "not many," you have a development problem that no amount of AI training will fix.

 

Third, invest in the operating model before you invest in more agents and fix your data foundations. It’s also important to build governance that enables experimentation without creating chaos and supports conditions where AI can deliver value instead of creating expensive complexity.

 

And finally, be honest with your people about what’s coming. The ‘readiness gap’ isn’t their fault. They need leaders who will build the chassis before revving the engine. Give them that, and you might get the transformation everyone keeps talking about. 

 

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Demetri Papazissis, CEO and Co-Founder of Superbo

 

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com and fizkes