7 WELCOME: SUMMER 2026 New ambitions Much of the hyperbole that revolves around AI is focused on the professions it will make redundant and the workforces it will slash in order to achieve efficiency gains. But among those enterprises that are making pioneering strides with AI, the reality is different. It is less about who AI can put out of a job, and more about how it can help people spend more of their time on high-value work, and achieve things that were not previously in reach. “The long-term value comes from elevating the role of every employee – giving them tools that help them operate at a higher level and empower them to achieve new ambitions,” says Kees Hertogh, vice president of global industry marketing at Microsoft, in our cover story for this issue. Microsoft refers to the organisations that are facilitating this empowerment among their workforce as ‘frontier firms’, where humans direct, manage and orchestrate AI agents to execute tasks while focusing their own time on strategy, creativity and outcomes. Partners are intrinsic to this transformation, developing services and solutions to help their clients to free up employee time. Coretek, for example, has embedded Microsoft Copilot agents across human resources, finance and operations for one of its clients, cutting onboarding cycle times by 40 per cent while lifting employee satisfaction measurably. You can read the perspectives of 12 partner firms as part of our cover feature, which begins on page 32. “The companies getting this right are not chasing technology,” says Chad Scheller of ServiceNow. “They are giving their people time back to do work that matters.” Employee empowerment is also a key theme of our focus on Copilot, beginning on page 68, where you can find out not only about the momentum in rollout of the AI companion, but also how partners including Introhive, Moody’s and Synergy Technical are integrating Copilot into their solutions. I hope you enjoy the read. ANDY CLAYTON-SMITH: EXECUTIVE EDITOR
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NzQ1NTk=