AI can analyze more data, generate more options, and complete more tasks than ever. Yet one of the newest findings about AI at work points in a surprising direction: the more AI enters the workplace, the more valuable certain deeply human abilities become.
The 2026 PwC Global AI Jobs Barometer, based on more than one billion job postings, found that new tasks appearing in AI-exposed jobs are 2.5 times more likely to require skills such as empathy, judgment, and creativity.
That suggests a technology investment many organizations are overlooking: the human being operating the technology.
The Other Kind of Technology
Most of what we call technology lives outside us. The steam engine. The printing press. Computers. And now, AI.
There is another category worth developing: internal sensing technology.
Internal sensing technology is our ability to notice and interpret information that doesn’t arrive neatly in a spreadsheet: our own reactions, another person’s emotional state, tension in a room, an emerging pattern, an intuition that something isn’t adding up.
Deeply Human and Learnable Capacities
Think empathy, self-awareness, intuition, reflection, deep listening, even the perspective we develop through meditation, stories and art.
Calling these capacities “technology” may sound unusual. But technology refers broadly to the practical application of knowledge. These are learnable human capacities that help leaders better perceive information and act on it.
And their business value appears to be rising.
Mirror: How Developed Is Your Internal Sensing Technology?
Ask yourself:
1. How much have you invested in your ability to sense what is happening inside yourself, between people, and beneath the obvious facts?
2. When facing an important decision, how readily can you move beyond more analysis and integrate what you may already be sensing?
For many leaders, the answers reveal an imbalance. Organizations spend fortunes upgrading their external tools while assuming their internal ones will somehow upgrade themselves.
They don’t.
Window: What Happens When Leaders Train Attention?
Former Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini was an early corporate advocate for mindfulness. After Aetna introduced meditation and yoga alongside broader wellness initiatives, employee medical claims declined and the company estimated about $9 million in savings, in large part due to those initiatives.
At General Mills, executives participating in mindful-leadership programs reported meaningful changes as well. Eighty percent said their ability to make decisions with clarity improved, while 89% reported better listening.
These aren’t proof that meditation magically produces profits. They point to something more useful: attention, self-awareness, and intuition can be deliberately and profitably trained.
Keep the conversation going.
As AI continues to reshape how we work, the human side of leadership matters more than ever. Follow Amare Leadership on social media for more insights, ideas, and conversations on leading with purpose in a changing world.
The Nile River Thought Experiment
Ancient Thebes in Egypt offers a wonderful metaphor.
The Nile divided a landscape with a striking contrast. Much of Thebes’ dense urban life—homes, markets, government, trade, and activity—was concentrated on the east bank, while the west bank was dominated by tombs, temples, and sacred spaces set apart from the city’s daily bustle. The divide wasn’t absolute, but it offers a compelling image of two essential modes: doing and producing on one side, quieting and sensing on the other.
Imagine your working life divided by a river.
On one bank: email, meetings, dashboards, AI, deadlines, decisions, output.
On the other: reflection, observation, intuition, listening, imagination.
Now ask: How much time do you spend on each bank?
Most executives have beachfront property on the first one, and maybe a little shack on the other.
Door: 4 Amare Ways to Upgrade Your Internal Sensing Technology
1. Practice stillness. Start with one minute of meditation a day. Sit, breathe, and notice what is happening rather than immediately doing something about it.
2. Pause before outsourcing your thinking. Before asking AI, a consultant, or even a colleague what to do, ask yourself: What am I already noticing? What feels important here?
3. Read the room—and yourself. In your next meeting, pay attention to tone, energy, hesitation, awkward silences, and your own physical reactions. They’re information too.
4. Exercise other ways of knowing. Read fiction. Look at art. Walk without headphones. Have a conversation without checking your phone. Give your mind room to make connections that aren’t prompted by an algorithm.
None of this means abandoning data. It means expanding what counts as useful data.
Amare Team Talk
Ask yourself, then discuss with your team:
Which of our internal sensing technologies most needs strengthening—and what could change if we developed it?
Choose Your Technologies Wisely
AI makes external technology more powerful by the day. That makes cultivating your internal technology more important, not less.
The leaders with an edge won’t necessarily be the ones with access to more information. Increasingly, everyone will have extraordinary information at their fingertips.
The edge will belong to the leaders who can discern what matters, sense what others are missing, and know when to stop asking the machine and listen more deeply to the humans in the room—including themselves.
Today’s Amare Wave Wednesday Quote
“Intuition does not denote something contrary to reason, but something outside of the province of reason.”
— Carl Jung
Click here and read more Amare Wave Wednesday newsletters on related topics:
AI as Humanity’s Mirror and Megaphone: How to Lead in Today’s AI Revolution
Do You Know You? 7 Amare Steps to Self-Aware Leadership
Be Quiet! A Powerful Habit Most Leaders Don’t Practice
Intuition, Instinct, and Fear: A Leader’s Guide to Knowing the Difference and Choosing Wisely
Timeless Leadership Lessons from the Best River Guides in the World
