How leaders can adapt to an unknowable AI future

{"text":[[{"start":6.72,"text":"The writer is visiting professor at Bayes Business School, London"}],[{"start":10.8,"text":"At this moment of rapid AI rollouts and pre-flotation speculation, it is harder than ever to make predictions."}],[{"start":17.92,"text":"Experimentation abounds in frontier laboratories and in workplaces. Anna Thomas, founding director of the UK’s Institute for the Future of Work, was right to observe at a recent FT Live conference on AI that “it’s a bit of a wild west out there”."}],[{"start":34.44,"text":"A time of such uncertainty calls for leadership. But what sort of approach will be effective? How should today’s leaders adapt to position their organisations for this exciting yet unknowable future?"}],[{"start":46.88,"text":"Maureen Costello, chief executive for the UK, Ireland and sub-Saharan Africa at Google Cloud, the technology giant’s remote computing and infrastructure business, says the leaders she is working with have moved beyond mere experimentation with AI and are asking how to move “at scale” — “how do I transform the work that my organisation needs to be doing?”"}],[{"start":69.52,"text":"“In terms of their mindset, they’re often curious,” she says. “They’re creative, they’re upskilling themselves. They’re using it . . . they’re becoming very fluent in AI.”"}],[{"start":80.2,"text":"Costello sees the emerging leadership challenge revolving around two related issues: the capacity and capability of the organisation, and the business problem that the organisation is trying to solve. “It’s about looking at changing or innovating on a process, or it’s really about transformation,” she says."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":98.72,"text":"At advertising technology company The Trade Desk, Philip Duffield, vice-president for northern Europe, says that for all the upbeat talk about the potential of AI, there is still a traditional leadership task of taking the organisation with you."}],[{"start":113.08,"text":"“For me as a leader, if we want to bring people along on this AI journey, they have to trust us,” he says. “They have to trust the technology, and that’s why it’s a learning curve for all of us.”"}],[{"start":123.76,"text":"Duffield urges a bit of caution against being dazzled by the claims made for AI and what the future holds, for example that whole job categories might disappear. “AI is only as good as the data that feeds it, and there’s still a lot that needs to happen around that,” he says. The human element of accountability is still required."}],[{"start":141.36,"text":"His industry revolves around creativity, “and I don’t think AI is going to replace that,” Duffield adds. “If you bring humans along with you, you can build the strategy, you can build the creativity, and then AI can help you execute and move faster . . . but the thought right now of leaving AI to just do everything for clients makes me a bit nervous.” Lawyers who have cited fictitious cases thanks to AI “hallucinations” might agree."}],[{"start":166.64,"text":"In his book Co-Existence: The Next Phase of AI, published this month, Wharton School associate professor Ethan Mollick, one of the leading scholars in applied AI, says that organisations may have to restructure to make the most of the opportunities offered by the technology. He sees three elements as being necessary: leadership, the lab, and the crowd. The leadership team has to be fully engaged in AI, encouraging risk-taking and playing an active role in its deployment. The lab is a committed body of people constantly researching how to transform the organisation. And the crowd are the active users of AI, experimenting with what is possible and sharing what they learn."}],[{"start":206.48,"text":"Another task for leaders in the AI-driven future will be to ensure their human judgment is not overwhelmed by the flow of apocalyptic forecasts and negative media reports, including over the agentic “swarms” that attacked Hugging Face. In her book Robot Souls: programming in humanity, Eve Poole, a consultant and author, advises leaders to cherish their human “junk code” — those qualities and characteristics that set them apart from AI."}],[{"start":233.12,"text":"Poole says the junk code consists of seven innate human qualities, including free will (our ability to choose), emotion (the essential bonding element of humanity) and storytelling (a way of transmitting core values and setting out a path to follow). “No one now seems to have a picture of the future,” she says. This is a central task for leaders: to offer a convincing and appealing account of where we are headed."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":256.64,"text":"“There’s science . . . and there’s art to this,” says Google Cloud’s Costello. “Part of the art . . . is about winning hearts and minds. Figuring out what is the secret sauce that you’re going to use that’s right for your culture,” she says. “As a leader, you have to be very open and transparent about it. I run ‘ask me anything’ sessions.”"}],[{"start":276.84,"text":"At the FT Live event, Brian Holliday, chief executive in the UK and Ireland for German industrial conglomerate Siemens, suggested creating a “fear of missing out” among staff as a way of encouraging greater uptake of AI. This may be worth a try."}],[{"start":293.08,"text":"Leaders will be impatient to realise the benefits of AI and see some positive results. But as they strive for this, it will also be worth remembering former US president Teddy Roosevelt’s timeless advice: that even as you have your eyes on the stars, it is necessary to keep your feet on the ground."}],[{"start":315.08,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1793369862_2615.mp3"}