There are worse places to pause and think about the Irish technology market than over an iced coffee in the sunshine.
This summer, I am speaking with Irish business and technology leaders about one question that keeps coming up in different ways, and it goes to the heart of IT leadership in Ireland.
How is AI changing what businesses now need from their technology leaders?
Not in theory or hype, but in the practical reality of Irish businesses trying to make better decisions around technology, data, people, risk and growth.
I have spent over 30 years placing senior IT and technology talent with Irish businesses, and this research is part of how I stay close to the market. You can read more about how I work here.
AI hiring in Ireland is moving fast
AI related hiring is no longer a niche part of the market.
A live search this week showed more than 1,000 AI related roles listed on IrishJobs for the Republic of Ireland and surrounding area. Across different platforms, the number appears to sit somewhere between 700 and 1,100 active AI related roles, depending on how tightly AI is defined against software, data and machine learning roles.
Not all of these are leadership roles, but the volume matters, because it shows how quickly AI capability is becoming part of the hiring market.
The leadership question is bigger than the number of AI roles being advertised. Many Irish businesses do not just need people who can work with AI. They need technology leaders who can decide where AI belongs, where it adds value, where it creates risk, and how it should be governed.
The pressure is no longer just about finding someone who understands the technology. It is about finding people who can help the business get the best from AI.
That takes judgement, governance and data awareness, but it also needs communication and commercial understanding, and the ability to prioritise where AI can make the biggest difference first, and then roll the strategy out across the whole organisation.
What I am hearing so far
The first of these conversations are already done, and one pattern has surprised me.
When I ask leaders to score their business out of ten on AI progress, the answers so far run from two to ten, and the striking part is who sits where.
The people most immersed in the technology seem to be the hardest markers of their own progress, because they can see how much further there is to go. In fairness, a business using AI well for what it needs may be right to score itself highly. The scale measures the journey each business believes it is on.
Who owns AI turns out to be a different story in almost every business. Nearly every leader I have spoken with can name the person, or the people, that everyone turns to. However, no two businesses have the same answer. In one it is enthusiasts inside the IT team. In another it is a project manager who sits outside IT entirely. In another it is a committee built for the purpose, and in one case the chief executive told me plainly that it is him, for now, but not for long.
Investment is rising faster than readiness
The CSO reported that more than 20% of Irish enterprises used AI in 2025, up from 15% in 2024. Among large enterprises, the figure was 58%.
EY’s June 2026 survey of 150 senior Irish technology leaders found that 82% are now investing in AI, up from 44% a year earlier, while skills shortages are now the single biggest constraint on delivery.
Deloitte’s 2026 findings point in the same direction, with 84% of Irish leaders saying skills gaps are the main barrier to traditional AI adoption, and 52% saying the same for generative AI.
That gap between investment and readiness is where leadership matters, because many businesses are being asked to move faster on AI before they have fully worked out who owns it, how it should be governed, what data it depends on, what risk it creates, and what kind of leadership is needed around the table.
How AI is changing IT leadership in Ireland
- A CTO role in one business may now need more commercial influence.
- A Head of IT role may need stronger governance and risk judgement.
- An IT Manager role may need more confidence working across the leadership team.
And a business that thinks it needs an “AI person” may actually need clearer technology leadership first. I wrote more about that distinction in AI hiring in Ireland.
This is the part I am most interested in. The real brief is rarely just the job title. It is what the business needs this person to change, protect, lead or make sense of.
How AI is changing IT leadership in Ireland is not just a technology story, it is a business leadership story.
The question is no longer whether this person can manage the technology. It is whether this person can help the business make better technology decisions in an AI enabled world.
Why I am doing this research now
It takes time from the day job, but it also makes the day job better.
Because if I am advising Irish businesses on senior IT and technology hiring, I need to stay close to what is happening in the market. I do not get that from salary guides or job descriptions. I get it from sitting down with business leaders and hearing what they are dealing with.
My sense already is this: AI is not replacing the need for strong IT leadership in Ireland, it is raising the standard of what good IT leadership now needs to look like.
The questions this research is asking
- How is AI changing the CTO and IT leadership role in Irish businesses?
- Who should own AI inside a business, and where should that responsibility sit?
- What should Irish companies look for when hiring senior IT and technology leaders now?
The full article, drawing on all of these conversations with Irish business and technology leaders, will be published here in September.
If AI is changing the kind of technology leadership your business now needs, I would be very interested to hear what you are seeing. You are very welcome to contact me directly at imelda@starrecruitment.ie or call me on +353 (0)87 293 2709.
Imelda O’Hanlon
