2026 Agenda

The traditional career ladder that built today’s retail CEOs is breaking—and no clear replacement has been built. As AI removes much of the work that once trained early talent and organizations flatten, fewer future leaders are gaining the experience, judgment, and resilience that leadership demands—they won’t get there the way you did. The question is no longer theoretical: if young leaders cannot emerge through the same paths that once produced senior leaders, then who is building the next generation—and how? This session confronts that reality head-on. Through a candid discussion with global retail CEOs, we explore how leaders are redesigning development from the ground up—creating new pathways, redefining what “empowering your people” actually means, and applying a “New CEO Playbook”—ten practical moves to build capability, accelerate learning, and strengthen the leadership bench. Because if this isn’t addressed now, the risk isn’t just a talent gap—it’s a leadership generation that never fully forms.