Business and industry leaders are operating in a different decision environment than even a few years ago. Decisions move faster. Scrutiny is higher. The room for misalignment is shrinking, often before organizations feel fully ready. AI and other emerging technologies are no longer side experiments. They now shape core workflows, operating models, and customer-facing execution. This shift creates opportunity and raises the stakes. Leaders are expected to move quickly, align teams earlier, and explain their reasoning clearly when decisions are questioned.
At IDC, this reality is shaping how we think about our role and how we are designing IDC Directions 2026.
IDC Directions 2026 is built to help leaders make high-stakes decisions with greater clarity. The focus is on evidence, dialogue, and real-world application, applied early enough to keep options open.
The challenge leaders are navigating right now
Most organizations have access to more information than ever. The harder problem is deciding how to act on it and explaining those choices once work is underway.
As AI becomes embedded across the enterprise, leaders across business, technology, and industry functions face a familiar set of tensions:
- Too many signals and not enough shared understanding
- Pressure to move quickly while still justifying decisions
- Tools that promise clarity but remain opaque in practice
In this environment, insight alone is not enough. Useful insight can be traced back to evidence, assumptions, and tradeoffs. Leaders also need space to test their thinking before decisions harden.
That need is influencing how IDC approaches both research and engagement.
Clarity at decision time comes from understanding how answers were formed and what they mean in practice.
What IDC is optimizing for in 2026
IDC’s focus this year goes beyond delivering conclusions. The emphasis is on helping leaders prepare for decisions they will be accountable for before, during, and after they are made.
In practical terms, that means prioritizing:
- Transparency into how conclusions are formed, not just what they are
- Direct dialogue that allows leaders to test assumptions and explore implications
- Application of insight in real decision contexts, not abstract scenarios
As AI moves from experimentation to enterprise-wide, agentic execution, the cost of unclear decisions rises quickly. Leaders need insight they can trace back to evidence before those decisions scale across teams, systems, and customers.
What does that focus mean for the Directions experience
IDC Directions 2026 is intentionally designed to reflect how leaders need to engage with insights today.
Instead of a single-track conference, the experience brings together perspective, dialogue, and application. The goal is to help leaders move from understanding what is changing to validating next steps.
That focus shows up in four core elements:
- Exclusive keynote sessions, where IDC leadership and analysts share research, market shifts, and action paths shaping the AI-driven economy
- Direct access to IDC analysts, including pre-scheduled 1:1 meetings for focused discussion around priorities, assumptions, and roadmaps
- Four in-depth breakout tracks, designed to support deeper exploration where decisions are most urgent
- The AI Lab, offering a hands-on look at AI-fueled intelligence tools from IDC and its strategic partners, with an emphasis on applied insight
A closer look at the four Directions tracks
Each Directions track is built around a distinct set of leadership decisions so attendees can focus their time where it matters most.
- AI‑Ready Infrastructure
How organizations are modernizing infrastructure, cloud platforms, and data center strategies to support agentic workloads, improve resilience, and scale responsibly. - Emerging Technologies
How agentic AI, along with technologies such as quantum and robotics, is reshaping industries, changing business models, and creating new sources of competitive advantage. - Trusted Data Foundations
How leaders are strengthening data platforms, security, and governance to unlock AI value while reducing risk and building organizational trust. - Marketing & Business Growth Strategies
How AI is changing growth strategies, go-to-market execution, and the future of work, and what leaders need to consider to stay competitive.
This is what clarity looks like in practice: insight that can be examined, discussed, and tested before it becomes a commitment.
Turning insight into confident action
IDC Directions works best when attendees arrive with a clear sense of the decisions they are navigating and use the event to validate, refine, and align their thinking before those decisions become difficult to reverse.
Those decisions may sit in business strategy, technology investment, or industry positioning. In each case, the value comes from pressure‑testing ideas in the open rather than carrying assumptions forward in isolation.
In periods of rapid change, confidence comes from weighing evidence, assessing tradeoffs, and moving forward with clarity.
That is the intent behind how IDC is designing Directions 2026 and why this year’s experience is focused on helping leaders build clarity they can stand behind, not just insight they can reference.
IDC Directions 2026
Boston | April 8, 2026
Register for IDC Directions 2026
https://www.idc.com/events/directions/
