09-10-2026IMPACT COUNCIL

Transformation doesn’t happen in the boardroom

Strategies succeed or fail through thousands of everyday workforce decisions, so leaders need to design accordingly.

[Photo: Getty Images]

The Fast Company Impact Council is an invitation-only membership community of top leaders and experts who pay dues for access to peer learning, thought leadership, and more.

Every company has a transformation agenda, whether it’s AI adoption, improved productivity, new operating models, or workforce agility.

But for organizations with large frontline workforces, the real transformation test is what happens when a manager needs to fill an open shift at 7 a.m.

That manager needs to know who is available, who has the right skills, what they will cost, whether assigning them creates a compliance issue, and how the decision affects the employee and the business. In many organizations, those answers aren’t easily found. This is where transformation breaks down.

In new research from my company, Dayforce, 80% of executives and managers shared that daily operations shift attention from transformation efforts or they........

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