Rewiring Tax Leadership for the AI Era

Artificial intelligence (AI) adoption is driving leaders throughout the organization to redesign traditional job descriptions and reporting lines.

For their part, tax executives are rethinking roles in their domains while creating mechanisms to elevate tax professionals’ AI proficiency. These training and development activities include engaging in prompt-engineering, using low-code and no-code (and vibe coding) tools, and strengthening semantic knowledge of business data, as Vertex Vice President of Technology Strategy Chris Zangilli reports.

But what about leadership roles – how will they change as the AI era progresses?

Until recently, AI’s impact on leadership competencies did not receive much attention. Now, as pressure to generate higher returns on AI investments intensifies, the board’s changing expectations of leadership priorities and performance are becoming clearer.

While these expectations squarely focus on the CEO and the rest of the C-suite, they also apply to the other top leadership layers, and indirect tax executives should take note of the following shifts:

• AI-era leadership requires personal AI use: BCG’s AI Radar survey research indicates that CEOs in the 70% of companies that are neither AI laggards (15% of organizations) nor AI leaders (also 15% of companies) spend at least seven hours a week working directly with AI. For indirect tax leaders, for example, this hands-on work might involve putting an AI-driven product categorization tool through its paces or using an LLM to create the first draft of an assessment appeal.
• Tax leaders and business leaders are also expected to operate as technology leaders: More than three-quarters of CEOs report that talent and technology leadership roles are converging, and 85% believe every functional business leader must now become a technology expert within their own domain, according to IBM’s 2026 CEO Study. For indirect tax leaders, this means that advanced tax automation and related AI tools are something that they, not their IT colleagues, own.
• Business and tax leaders are accountable for their technology investments: Operating as a technology leader means taking responsibility for generating tangible returns from technology investments. Half of the CEOs in the IBM survey believe their own jobs are on the line if organizational AI investments fail to produce measurable returns. One of the best, and quickest, ways to start optimizing AI investments is by taking full advantage of the AI functionalities within existing solutions, including tax automation.
• Leaders must transform traditional talent management: As AI adoption drives job redesigns, traditional career paths and development trajectories also need to be overhauled. PwC’s 2026 Global AI Jobs Barometer reveals that entry-level roles heavily exposed to AI are seven times more likely to demand traditionally senior skills such as strategic judgment, problem-solving, and leadership. Like other executives, tax leaders – often in collaboration with their HR counterparts – will need to develop innovative ways to develop senior-level competencies in early-career professionals.

As tax leaders adapt to the AI era, they’ll likely find themselves spending more time on the most “human” aspects of their roles: mobilizing their teams around a new strategic vision and laying the groundwork for ongoing upskilling. In doing so, they will build cultures that prioritize innovation and AI governance while setting the tone for continuous improvements to tax compliance and planning activities.