Shivanku Misra is Vice President of Advanced Analytics and AI at McKesson, where he leads enterprise-wide AI and analytics initiatives in one of the most highly regulated and mission-critical sectors.
His career has been shaped by working at the intersection of technology, business performance, and human outcomes. Shivanku has built and scaled AI and analytics capabilities across healthcare, payments, consumer, hospitality, and industrial organizations, including McKesson, PayPal, CVS Health, Coca-Cola, Dell, Heineken, Hilton, and Gannett. This breadth of experience has given him a pragmatic perspective on how AI creates value in very different operating contexts.
Early in his career, Shivanku learned that models alone do not create value; decisions do. Working closely with finance, supply chain, pricing, and operations teams reinforced the importance of designing AI that changes how people work and how organizations perform. This insight pushed his focus beyond model development toward building enterprise AI platforms, operating models, and teams that can deliver impact at scale.
At McKesson, Shivanku leads advanced analytics and AI across the enterprise, navigating the complexity of deploying AI responsibly in a regulated healthcare environment. This experience has strengthened his belief that effective AI leadership depends as much on trust, domain expertise, and change management as it does on algorithms and technology.
Shivanku is known for a strong bias for action, deep respect for practitioners, and a disciplined focus on aligning AI initiatives with purpose and measurable outcomes.
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?
“The traits that matter most for data and AI leadership today go well beyond technical depth. What matters first is business judgment, the ability to understand where AI can genuinely move the needle and where it cannot. Closely tied to that is credibility with operators, earned by spending time in the details of finance, supply chain, pricing, and frontline workflows, not just in dashboards or models.
“For me, influence and transformation at McKesson went hand in hand. Changing minds required meeting leaders where they were listening first, respecting existing expertise, and framing AI as a partner to judgment rather than a replacement for it. I focused on aligning incentives, making value visible early, and tying every initiative to outcomes leaders already cared about: cash flow, service levels, patient impact, and employee productivity.
“Equally important was navigating change with trust. In a highly regulated, mission-critical environment, progress came from being transparent about risks, governance, and trade-offs, while still maintaining a bias for action. By influencing across levels, from frontline teams to the C-suite; and embedding AI into the operating rhythm, we moved from skepticism to ownership, and from pilots to sustained, enterprise-wide impact.”
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?
“One non-traditional piece of advice I’d give is this: stop trying to be the smartest person in the room and start trying to be the most useful one.
“Early in an AI leader’s career, technical brilliance earns credibility. But at the C-suite level, what sets leaders apart is their ability to simplify complexity, make trade-offs visible, and help others make better decisions under uncertainty. That means speaking the language of cash flow, risk, trust, and people, not models and architectures.
“The fastest way into the C-suite is to behave like a general manager before you have the title. Take ownership of outcomes that aren’t “yours,” lean into uncomfortable conversations, and make the business successful even when the credit doesn’t come back to AI. When leaders see that you consistently put enterprise results ahead of function, they stop seeing you as an AI leader and start seeing you as an executive.”