Abhishek Khandelwal is Head of Decision Intelligence at Barclays Bank Plc, where he leads analytics and AI strategy across the UK retail and business banking franchises.
He has been with Barclays since 2012, holding a range of senior roles spanning business banking, advanced analytics, and unsecured lending. His work has covered credit risk, marketing, and customer analytics across major portfolios including personal loans, overdrafts, and credit cards, as well as driving innovation and growth in SME and corporate banking products and services.
Abhishek began his career in analytics at a time when data was largely viewed as a back-office capability. Early roles shaped his ability to translate complex analysis into narratives that influence real business decisions. Prior to Barclays, he worked at Lloyds Banking Group and Barclaycard, developing analytical solutions for customer acquisition, retention, and profitability in the credit card industry. His career started at ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, where he led business intelligence and reporting for sales and distribution.
As his responsibilities expanded, Abhishek focused on building cross-functional teams that combine technical depth with commercial insight, reflecting his belief that analytics delivers impact only when integrated into the business. A defining phase of his career has been leading large-scale data and AI transformation programmes, where cultural change, governance, and trust proved as critical as the technology itself.
Today, Abhishek champions AI literacy across Barclays, promoting the view that AI should augment rather than replace human judgement. His leadership philosophy is grounded in a simple principle: while technology evolves rapidly, trust, clarity, and collaboration remain the foundations of effective decision intelligence.
As a data and AI leader, which traits and skills do you think matter most, and which of those have been most influential for you in your current position?
“Effective data and AI leadership demands a blend of technical fluency and human-centric skills. At Barclays, AI fluency (understanding technologies, ethical frameworks, and emerging trends) has been foundational. Leaders who grasp how AI tools operate can drive meaningful conversations and embed innovation into business processes. Equally critical are adaptability and curiosity, enabling leaders to navigate rapid change and foster a culture of experimentation.
“Non-technical traits matter just as much. Empathy and relationship management build trust across diverse teams, while storytelling and communication transform complexity into clarity for senior stakeholders. These skills have been most influential in our organisation because they bridge the gap between technical teams and business leaders, ensuring alignment and accelerating adoption.
“Finally, collaboration and cultural activation stand out. By creating psychological safety and encouraging cross-functional partnerships, we’ve moved beyond siloed analytics to enterprise-wide decision intelligence. This combination of technical depth and human leadership has been pivotal in making data-driven thinking non-negotiable across the organisation.
Reflecting on your career, what is one non-traditional piece of advice (outside of technical skills) you would give to an aspiring data or AI leader aiming for the C-suite?
“Shift from being the smartest person in the room to being the sense-maker. Your edge isn’t technical omniscience; it’s turning ambiguity into shared clarity and action. Start by anchoring every AI conversation on outcomes, not algorithms, and set simple guardrails that spell out when machines lead and when humans must.
“Create psychological safety so teams can run fast, responsible experiments and use decision logs, pre-mortems, and lightweight post-mortems to learn publicly. Translate complexity into plain language for boards and frontline colleagues alike and model the behaviour: use AI tools in your own workflow and show your working. Operate at two speeds two ship value quickly while strengthening data quality, governance and ethics.
“Finally, build trust capital: hold sponsors accountable for adopting insights, celebrate kills as much as launches, and credit wins to the team. In the C-suite, you rise by truly increasing everyone else’s effectiveness, not by having the most code, charts, or dashboards.”