Re-engineering Work in 2025: What CHROs and CIOs must execute in 2026

2025 was the year organizations stopped talking about AI and started confronting work itself.

Across Reejig’s Skills Connect Podcast and global executive webinars hosted by CEO Siobhan Savage, one reality became unavoidable: AI does not transform organizations. Redesigned work does.

The most forward-leaning leaders moved beyond roles, headcount, and tools. They focused on tasks, workflows, and outcomes, and on how humans and AI actually collaborate to deliver value.

1. Learning and capability shifted from programs to the flow of work

In 2025, development stopped being an event and became part of how work gets done.

Leaders consistently emphasized that static training models cannot keep pace with constantly changing work. Capability must evolve as tasks evolve.

Voices shaping this shift

• Sandra Loughlin emphasized continuous capability building aligned to real work, not point-in-time requirements.
  
• Dennis Di Lorenzo highlighted the growing disconnect between education systems and how work is actually performed inside organizations.
  

What changed

• Development became embedded into day-to-day tasks
• Capability was defined by outcomes, not credentials
• Learning cycles shortened to match operational change
  
  

2. Workforce planning moved from jobs to task-level intelligence

2025 marked the collapse of job-based planning as a reliable operating model.

Organizations recognized that roles hide where work actually happens. Tasks reveal where automation, augmentation, and redeployment create value.

Leaders driving this conversation

• Brian Hackett called for predictive, task-based workforce forecasting.
  
• Amy Wilson demonstrated how task visibility improves hiring, development, and internal movement.
  
• Bill Pelster argued that tasks, not titles, are the true building blocks of modern organizations.
  

What task-based planning enables

• Faster redeployment of work
  
• Evidence-based automation decisions
  
• Reduced dependency on external hiring
  

3. Ethical AI became core operating infrastructure

In 2025, ethical AI shifted from policy to system design.

Leaders were clear: if AI influences how work is assigned, evaluated, or automated, organizations must be able to explain and audit those decisions.

Key voices on responsible AI

• Kathleen Mattie warned that transparency is non-negotiable when AI affects people’s work.
  
• Michael Fraccaro and JoAnne Stonier called for governance to be embedded directly into AI systems, not layered on afterward.
  

What ethical AI requires

• Explainable task-level decisions
• Continuous monitoring for unintended impact
• Clear accountability across HR, IT, and the business
  

4. Work intelligence replaced job architecture

2025 exposed the limits of static job frameworks.

Organizations began replacing role catalogs with living systems that show how work actually flows across humans and AI.

Job architecture vs work architecture

Leaders reinforcing this shift

• Jason Averbook challenged organizations to stop “transforming” and start continuously reinventing operating models.
  
• Josh Bersin reinforced that AI maturity depends on redesigning work, not accelerating existing processes.

5. Internal mobility became a business necessity, not a perk

High-performing organizations stopped hoarding talent and started moving work.

Internal opportunity marketplaces emerged as critical infrastructure for agility, retention, and resilience.

Leaders advancing internal mobility

• Trish Steed emphasized that mobility is essential to business performance.
  
• Gareth Flynn highlighted employee demand for visibility into real opportunities, not just job postings.
  

What employees expect

• Transparency into available work
  
• Fair, task-based matching
  
• Clear pathways beyond promotions
  

What organizations gained

• Faster response to change
  
• Lower attrition during transformation
  
• Better use of existing capability
  

6. Human-centered work design accelerated change

Empathy proved to be an execution advantage.

Organizations that prioritized safety, trust, and clarity moved faster and with less resistance.

Human-centered leadership voices

• Kason Morris emphasized empathy and co-creation in work design.
  
• Meg Bear reframed psychological safety as operational infrastructure.
  
• Deborah Yates closed the Skills Connect season with a call for courageous, transparent leadership.
  

Executive Synthesis: What 2025 made clear

1. AI only creates value when embedded into workflows
2. Task-level visibility is now foundational infrastructure
3. Ethical AI must be designed, not governed later
4. Transformation is continuous, not episodic
5. Human experience directly affects execution speed

2026 Predictions: What enterprise leaders must prove next

1. Insight without action will be treated as failure

Dashboards will no longer satisfy boards. Leaders will be asked what changed and what value was delivered.

2. AI pilots will end

Production impact at scale will become the minimum bar.

3. Workflows will become the unit of change

Success will be measured by redesigned workflows, not deployed tools.

4. Work architecture will replace job architecture

Organizations will operate with living systems that reflect how work actually happens.

5. HR will lead the human side of AI change

CHROs will play a central role in guiding trust, readiness, and adoption.

Executive FAQ

What is Work Intelligence?
Work intelligence is the ability to see, measure, and redesign work at the task level across humans and AI to improve outcomes.

Why are jobs no longer enough?
Jobs obscure how work actually happens. Tasks expose where change, automation, and augmentation create value.

Who owns AI-driven work redesign?
It is a shared mandate across HR, IT, and business leaders, with HR leading the human impact.

Why do most AI initiatives stall?
Because work is not redesigned first.

Conclusion

2026 will not reward ambition. It will reward execution.

The organizations that succeed will be those that build the systems and discipline to continuously redesign work, responsibly and at scale.

See how task-level visibility enables ethical AI, mobility, and workforce agility → Book a demo.