The Executive job market presents a puzzle that’s capturing attention across both boardrooms and Executive Search firms. As of June 2025, the UK had seen 35 consecutive periods of decline in job vacancies against a backdrop of GDP growth – albeit minimal. This suggests a structural shift rather than a cyclical downturn. With the rise of AI and automation, this trendline can only become more acute. What can executives do to ensure they thrive in this new normal?
James Reed, CEO of Reed, said his company had seen a 25 per cent fall in advertised vacancies year on year. “In my decades of working in recruitment, I have never seen anything like this,” he admitted. “After the financial crisis of 2008, we had 16 months of declining vacancies, which was bad enough, but then they started to come back.”
He warns that the hollowing-out effect impacting junior and mid-tier white-collar roles is now reaching senior management layers. Data backs this up: Hiring for white-collar roles dropped 12.7% in the year to Q1 2025, outpacing even blue‑collar decline. Graduate and entry-level job ads have dropped 33%, while mid-senior roles – especially in project management, operations, and generalist leadership – are increasingly automated or outsourced. Meanwhile, the number of job applications posted on LinkedIn has risen to 11,000 per minute – up 45% in just a year.
However executive compensation and demand for AI-literate leadership are rising. High-value roles that integrate AI governance, strategic transformation, and innovation oversight are growing. Those who can shape and lead change – not just manage the status quo – are thriving.
That reflects what we at Rialto are seeing in the market and hearing from executive clients. Those who first come to us seeking new positions or looking for a career change are finding it harder and harder and it is taking longer without professional support. Those in position may feel insecure and intimidated by the march of the machines.
However, there are steps executives can and should take now to secure their futures and take control of their career trajectories: first and foremost, they need to evolve with the AI-driven economy, to review and update their skillsets. That applies equally to any senior leadership in position or on the market. New roles are being created globally to manage this broad and rapid business transformation, and existing roles are changing to incorporate AI adoption, deployment and oversight.
In order to plan effectively, leaders should start by gaining a greater understanding of economic drivers – what has happened in previous periods of seismic change, who profited and how, and what might be coming next? Identify which services and products will people always want or need, look to the horizon, how is it shaping up? Leaders need to show vision and imagination, as well as a genuine understanding of the flow of traffic. They should read tech-based news as well as that covering their own sector and seek out knowledge that is outside of the public scope through personal relationships with mentors, coaches and networks.
Cyclical unemployment occurs during normal economic fluctuations, the ebb and flow of business cycles. When demand decreases temporarily, companies reduce hiring and may implement layoffs, but these positions typically return as economic conditions improve.
Structural unemployment, by contrast, represents permanent changes in how economies function. Rather than being caused by the ups and downs of the business cycle, structural unemployment is caused by fundamental shifts in the makeup of the economy. For example, jobs lost in the coachbuilding sector, once automobiles came to dominate. These changes don’t reverse when economic conditions improve – they represent the new normal.
The Industrial Revolution of 1750 – 1860 provides perhaps the most instructive historical parallel to today’s AI-driven employment changes. Technological progress, education and an increasing capital stock transformed England into the workshop of the world, fundamentally reshaping the nature of work itself.
Mechanisation displaced huge swathes of the workforce, eliminating many roles altogether. Despite early disruption, resistance, and societal unrest, the Industrial Revolution ultimately created more jobs than it destroyed, though in entirely different sectors and requiring different skills. The transformation wasn’t just about technology – it fundamentally changed how society organised work, education, and economic opportunity. The same can be said, though to a lesser extent, of the Great Depression of the 1920s, the 2007-2009 global recession and, arguably, the Covid pandemic.
As with industrialisation, there is no going back on AI, and those who adapt most quickly, embrace new technologies and business models and develop new skills will thrive, just as they did in the 19th century. Periods of significant structural change often create opportunities for those who adapt quickly, while leaving behind those who wait for conditions to “return to normal” or until they feel the direct impact – redundancy or difficulty getting back into the market.
Unlike previous downturns that primarily affected lower-skilled roles, today’s changes are reaching senior management layers. AI and automation are transforming decision-making processes traditionally handled by middle and senior management. Meanwhile we are seeing the emergence of entirely new C-suite roles such as Chief AI Officers, Chief Transformation Officers and Chief Resilience Officers, again indicating structural rather than cyclical change.
Instead of focusing on the 92 million jobs expected to be displaced by 2030, leaders could plan for the projected 170 million new ones and the new skills those will require. This represents net job creation, but with fundamentally different skill requirements, as we have explored in previous insights such as this one.
Wage premium for AI – and AI-adjacent skills for workers in the same role – is up to 56%, according to PwC, from 25% in 2024, showing that the market is already rewarding adaptation. The opportunity exists for executives who proactively develop relevant capabilities.
1.Reframe Their Value Proposition
Traditional executive roles focused on oversight and coordination are most at risk. The opportunity lies in repositioning around areas where human judgment, creativity and strategic thinking provide irreplaceable value, such as AI Governance and Ethics leading responsible AI implementation, Transformation Leadership, guiding organisations through fundamental change, Innovation Strategy, identifying and capitalising on emerging opportunities, and Cultural Leadership, maintaining human connection and purpose during technological transformation.
2. Develop Hybrid Competencies
The executives thriving in this environment combine traditional leadership skills with technological fluency, including data literacy – understanding how AI-generated insights inform strategic decisions – change management, scenario planning and ecosystem thinking – managing partnerships between human teams and AI systems. They are taking charge of their own role evolutions – before others decide for them. That includes auditing daily tasks to determine what is strategic vs. automatable, building internal influence as a change agent and aligning closely with value creation metrics – revenue, productivity, culture health – to remain indispensable.
3. Adopt an “AI Co-Pilot” Mentality
Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, recently said AI is now doing 30–50% of the company’s work: “Digital employees are here. Every department is being reshaped,” he said. While tech companies are the outliers, the rest of the world will inevitably follow. According to PwC, 100% of industries are increasing AI usage. Executives must now view AI as a strategic partner. Leaders should upskill in AI governance, prompt engineering, and data ethics, lead transformation initiatives that embed AI into daily workflows and model adaptive learning behaviours across their teams.
4. Position as a Specialist, Not a Generalist
Employers don’t want general managers; they want problem-solvers who can lead under uncertainty, integrate AI, and transform operations. Traditional methods of job searching, such as broad CV distribution and passive networking, are increasingly ineffective. A sharper strategy is required: highlight domain-specific transformation results, demonstrate fluency in tech-led change and leadership based in values, especially guarding and guiding culture through disruption.
5. Create Opportunities
Rather than competing for traditional roles, successful executives are designing new pathways including portfolio careers, advisory positions offering transformation expertise to multiple organisations, thought leadership and entrepreneurial ventures that address structural market needs.
Navigating structural change requires more than individual effort – it demands strategic guidance and systematic skill development. Professional executive coaching and advisory services provide several critical advantages. Structured support can offer objective assessment, for example, helping to identify blind spots and growth areas that internal reflection might miss. The best professional executive career services will have their own, exclusive market intelligence. This includes specialists who maintain current knowledge of emerging role categories and skill premiums across sectors.
Coaches can also help with strategic positioning, reframing executive value propositions to align with structural market changes rather than fighting against them. They should also have access to hidden networks, through which they can provide introductions to emerging opportunities and industry leaders navigating similar transitions.
While structural employment changes create uncertainty, they also generate tremendous opportunities for executives willing to embrace transformation, value creation and leadership impact. History shows that periods of fundamental economic shift often create the conditions for exceptional career growth and impact.
The executives who will thrive over the next five years are those who recognise structural change as permanent rather than temporary and understand the urgency in investing in developing AI-complementary skills now rather than waiting until they hit a problem.
They will position themselves as transformation leaders rather than status quo managers, build diverse, portfolio-based career strategies to fill in any gaps in their experience, skills and knowledge and seek professional guidance to navigate complex transitions effectively.
At Rialto Consultancy, we help executives recognise and capitalise on these structural shifts through strategic coaching, transformation planning and career repositioning programmes. The question isn’t whether the employment landscape will continue to evolve – it’s whether you’ll lead that evolution or be shaped by it.
The future belongs to executives who embrace adaptation as a core competency and professional support as a strategic advantage. The structural shifts we’re experiencing today are creating tomorrow’s leadership opportunities for those prepared to seize them.
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