This multigroup session will focus on questions like: How should data and analytics teams be structured to maximize business value, align with strategy, and support governance, AI and data quality across distributed environments? Join this session to learn more.

As the CDAO role continues to evolve in the AI era, organizations face critical decisions about the direction and impact of their data leadership. This session explores the future of the CDAO through three distinct archetypes: Expert, Collaborator and Pioneer. Attendees will learn how to assess and choose the archetype that best aligns with their organization’s AI ambition and strategic goals. Attendees will leave with actionable insights to define their CDAO journey and position themselves and their organizations for success in a rapidly changing digital landscape.

Join an interactive executive discussion on emerging trends from the 2026 CDAO Agenda Survey, highlighting cost optimization for D&A, scalable design patterns and the use of AI to improve D&A operations. Discover how these insights can drive efficiency and innovation across your organization.

CDAOs need to rapidly gain enterprise trust and establish themselves as critical business enablers. They must create a strong, differentiated and successful brand for the D&A function, in order to gain stakeholder buy-in and engagement.

With new pressures coming from AI, CDAOs must be agile in implementing and enabling business innovation. But, with quick adaptation, inevitably comes stress on traditional D&A delivery processes and practices. Join this interactive session to lean how to: clarify strategies to support business innovation, design adaptable and scalable delivery models and collaborate with business units to ensure value of D&A capabilities and services.

CDAOs are making investments daily. Perhaps you're looking to grow your team, or maybe making a technology investment to support GenAI, or another investment where you need to build buy-in and gain funding. This workshop will help you develop personal influence skills while also building a strong story for investment.

D&A leaders and teams are at an AI-driven inflection point. They are crucial to enable business value through AI-readiness but must evolve their strategy and operating model to meet their organization’s AI ambitions. Reporting from the Gartner 2025 CDAO Agenda Survey, this session reveals actions successful D&A leaders have taken to deliver business outcomes from AI, data, and analytics, and what they need to do next year.