A Different Kind of Resilience: How UK & Irish Businesses Are Prioritising Action Amidst Chaos

An Unpredictable Landscape

For leading UK and Irish businesses, the news over the last few months has been relentless. We know from talking to our customers that the ongoing challenges of unwelcome tax burdens, rising labour costs, and AI integration have continued to pressure leaders.

To understand how SME peers are responding, we spoke to 714 business leaders across the UK and Ireland. Behind obvious concerns about current challenges, we saw a cautious optimism and a different approach to staying resilient under pressure.

Agile leaders lean in to tough times

Following Brexit and COVID, the British economy has been marked by periods of reduced economic investment. Cash-strapped businesses dealing with the disruption and long-term changes ushered in by these events have naturally reacted by delaying or reducing investments (ONS).

However, some unexpected positives from these recent challenges are now coming to the fore, as Neil Hughes, CEO, Azets Ireland, observes,

“One of the key lessons from COVID, which can be applied now to the geopolitical uncertainty we've got, was the need to act quickly, the time value of quick decision-making. In difficult situations, the boldest measures tend to be the safest.”

This new emphasis marks a shift away from a ‘batten down the hatches’ approach. In its place is a rising focus on operational agility and leadership capability. But why? They’re building for adaptability. Businesses are navigating a tough market and fierce competition as new technology is driving an increasingly fast pace of change.  They really have no choice but to invest in innovation and new tech, just to stay in the race.

Technology Adoption Becomes a Competitive Priority

Business leaders are aware of this next wave in digital transformation and they’re increasingly committed to making it happen. In the latest Azets Barometer we asked leaders to identify those areas they expected to see the greatest change in over the next 12 months: digitalisation and automation/AI tools topped the list.

Reported AI-adoption is robust, with 36% of UK and 37% of Irish businesses in the advanced stages of AI adoption and 37% and 49% respectively in early adoption. Although slightly behind their Nordic peers, UK and Irish leaders are working to keep their firms competitive by making AI a priority.

Right now, the business climate favours those who stay agile and embrace change. Smaller businesses have a real advantage here: they can manage costs while quickly adapting to new ideas, a balance that larger, heavier organisations often struggle to manage.

As Azets UK CEO, Peter Gallanagh, says,

“In the past, weathering an economic storm meant hoarding cash and battening down the hatches. Today, the most successful leaders are telling us a different story. They are prioritizing operational agility and leadership capability above all else. They are realizing that you cannot simply save your way to growth; you have to innovate your way there.”

Resilient Businesses Today: Quick & Decisive Beats Holding Cash

This mindset shows up in a few ways in our data. Firstly, in outlook. We asked, “which factors are most critical to your organisation’s resilience?” In both countries moving quickly and making decisions was more important than keeping cash reserves.

The second indicator was in openness to foreign investment. A solid 44% of UK business owners expressed willingness to accept investment from non-UK businesses to fuel growth.

In Ireland, a buoyant business environment is visible in leaders’ near-term predictions. 3 out of 5 leaders expect their turnover to increase over the next year and both business outlook and performance sit above the survey average.

Overall, our data tells us that despite economic and geopolitical headwinds, British and Irish leaders are displaying cautious optimism. As Gallanagh comments,

“We’re seeing some key metrics on the macroeconomic environment improving, and hopefully they will continue to improve, but that is compounded by all the wonderful work that SMEs do to ensure they're super resilient through these difficult periods.”

Whatever the outlook, UK and Irish leaders are backing themselves to transform their businesses into lean, agile, and innovative organisations.

This blog is based on data from the Q1 2026 Azets Barometer.

Explore all the data online in the Q1 2026 Azets Barometer Dashboard. 

To see the full story, including country-level breakdowns and sector insights, download the Q1 2026 Azets Barometer Report.

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