The future of insights leadership

If you had told me in 1999 that one day I would talk about “research agents” and Human Experience (HX) platforms instead of SPSS files and CATI scripts, I would probably have asked you what on earth an “agent” was supposed to do with my quota plan. I wasn’t planning any holidays or trying to sell a house. 

Now the mystery has revealed itself, the latest development in a diverse career in insights. I have been lucky enough to have already experienced three big waves in research: The shift from CATI to digital, the shift from siloed surveys to integrated data, and now the rise of AI across the entire workflow. 

Being in insights leadership throughout these waves myself has taught me something many might think is surprisingly simple: The leaders who make it through are the ones who obsess over how humans consume data, not just how we collect it. 

Let me explain, starting where it all began: With a pile of SPSS files and some very honest client feedback. 

“These SPSS files are great, but…”

I started my career in 1999 at a fieldwork house, scripting CATI surveys and pushing a lot of data through telephone and early web interviews. 

Every time I sent the SPSS data off, I heard a version of the same line: “These SPSS files are great, but we need to consume this data in a faster, different way.”  

That sentence has probably shaped my career more than any job title. Because it constantly reminded me that nobody buys raw data. They buy the ability to use data. So that was my mission. That simple complaint from clients is what led me to found Dapresy in 2003 (now Forsta’s Visualizations). The objective was very clear, we said that we are only going to be good at doing one thing: Taking any kind of market research data and efficiently visualizing it for different stakeholders, but always easy to consume. 

And it worked! From one person in Sweden to more than 100 people operating in regions across the globe, that mission has scaled. 

Looking at the industry today, I see the same pattern. Esomar’s latest breakdown shows roughly a third of the 142 billion dollar ecosystem is now driven by companies whose primary business is analytics platforms and software, not classic full-service research. Even now, the firms that thrive are not necessarily the most diversified. They are usually the ones with a very sharp answer to a very specific problem. 

If your internal stakeholders or agency clients still feel like they are receiving data instead of answers, then the technology may have moved on, but your insights leadership has not. 

For future leaders, that is lesson one: Specialize around a value outcome, avoiding buzzword. Your stakeholders will remember your ability to make data usable long after they forget which methodology you used. 

Staying in the research lane while the industry fragments

Over time, Dapresy partnered with private equity, merged with Confirmit, joined forces with FocusVision and eventually became part of Forsta and was renamed Visualizations. 

The product portfolio grew. The company expanded into CX and EX. The acronyms multiplied, as they always do. 

But one thing didn’t change. The golden thread in my journey has always been that I’ve been focusing wholeheartedly on market research. I have always stayed in the lane in market research because creating offerings and value propositions for market research professionals really requires a strong focus, and this did not limit us. 

The lesson for tomorrow’s leaders: Pick your lane, then build relentlessly for the messy reality of that lane. 

The balancing act

Messy reality is the key here. Leaders can become too overprotective and inflexible. There’s a careful balance between staying in your lane, fostering a great team that excels alongside you, and focusing so hard on the straight ahead that you forget to use the wheel when the twists and turns come along. 

The successful leaders, those who have stuck around alongside me, are those who can commit to their mission and evolve with the market at the same time.  

The current balancing act leaders are facing is how to enhance their value proposition, keep the talent they have and add AI in a meaningful, sensible way. Given what we see in AI investment and expected productivity gains, it is obvious that AI will be deeply embedded in how we work. 

I would think of research agents as junior colleagues who never sleep but still need direction. If you do not give them clear instructions, your outputs will reflect that. At the same time, your human team members can find deeper or expanded ways to add value. Use the time savings to make the most of their unique skills, their expertise that AI can’t replicate, all for the better of the overall mission. 

Shifts that shaped how I think about change

I sometimes joke that I have lived through three careers in one, because the underlying technology has changed so dramatically. This has also given me perspective on what’s happening now in research. I don’t see AI jeopardizing the market research industry. It is one of the trend shifts that happens, like others, over the last 20 to 30 years. 

There’s always change, and change needs to happen because that’s the way you stay modern and follow the latest technology. 

For future insight leaders, the question is not “Will AI change things?” It is “Do you want to be the one steering that change, or the one explaining it after the fact?” 

Research agents

At Forsta, we talk more and more about something we call “research agents.” These are AI-driven helpers that sit inside your workflow and take on specific tasks that used to be manual. 

AI already supports us when it comes to repetitive tasks, finding conclusions in big data sets, and guiding us toward where to focus. In practice, I see three big changes insights leadership should be aware of. 

How we design surveys 

For more than 20 years, we have been scripting surveys manually by dragging and dropping, copying and pasting Word text into survey tools. 

I expect that to change: We will complement that process with a more automated process where you collaborate in a Word document, then feed it to a tool that automatically scripts the survey questions. 

We will also use AI to be inspired about what questions to ask and which target groups to reach. 

How we prepare and process data 

Once the data is collected, there is a familiar checklist of tasks: Cleaning, coding, weighting, structuring, building derived variables, and preparing outputs for reporting. 

There will be AI helping us to do the repetitive tasks when it comes to preparing data and being ready for reporting. 

That aligns with what we see outside research. Thomson Reuters’ Future of Professionals report finds that knowledge workers expect AI to save them up to 12 hours per week by 2029, with four hours freed up in the next year alone. 

Think about what your team could do with an extra working day every week, without hiring anyone. 

How we create value 

Most important of all, research agents should give you back the one resource you never have enough of: Time to think. 

That does not mean your job becomes easier. It means your excuses become weaker. If AI is clearing the undergrowth, you are expected to build the next level and come up with new ways to provide value. 

What I would do if I were starting again in 2026

I disagree with those worrying about research dying, research roles disappearing. Some things will be different or more challenging, but overall, if I were to start over, I would still choose market research as my lane. 

The tools will change. They already have, several times. The acronyms will change. They always do. The constant, for me, is the responsibility: To help people understand. 

The future of insights leadership is not about predicting the next technology wave. It is about using every wave, old and new, to move clients and stakeholders from data to decisions with more clarity, more speed, and more humanity. 

Find out more about the result of Forsta’s mission by requesting a demo. 

Listen to more from Tobi: The Founders & Leaders Series, Insight Platforms.