A little over two years after the launch of ChatGPT suddenly made artificial intelligence a reality for those who were not at the cutting edge of the technological revolution much of the attention has remained focused on what its effect will be on jobs and productivity. And, until recently, the assumption has been that the big changes would be to lower-level positions. After all, we have already seen the emergence of ever-more capable robots in factories and a reduction in the numbers of trainees taken on by professional services firms because AI is able to do much of the due diligence and other checking work much more effectively.
But — suddenly, it seems — AI is making its presence felt further up organisations. A recent book, The HBR Guide to Generative AI for Managers, sets out how the technology can be used as a “co-thinker,” enabling executives to engage in more strategic and critical thinking supported by AI providing such resources as examples to support arguments or research, taking different perspectives and challenging assumptions.
The authors of the book are Elisa Farri and Gabrielle Rosari, respectively vice-president and director of content and research at international consultancy Capgemini Invent’s Management Lab. In a recent interview, they explained how developments in the technology made it much more than a productivity tool. Pointing out that most of managers’ tasks were complex, Farri said that AI could be used as “a sparring partner.” She added that the value would come from not just asking questions, but from having conversations with a view to solving problems and refining thinking. Rosari said that a recent survey indicated that about 80% of managers could see the potential but that only a minority were able to move towards co-thinking. There was “a culture gap between ambition and action,” he added.
As with many other areas of management practice, this gulf between leaders and laggards is likely to have significant ramifications for organizations. Unsurprisingly, MBA students that the authors have talked to appear to be rather further ahead in terms of adoption of the approach than current managers. And this will put additional pressure on those already in place to wake up to the opportunities being presented. “It’s a responsibility,” said Farri. “They don’t need to be experts, just get their hands dirty, and also be aware of the risks and traps.”
One experienced executive who has been quick to see the potential in AI is Andrew Rashbass, former chief executive of The Economist Group, Reuters and Euromoney Institutional Investor. More recently, he has been working with the van der Schaar Lab, a world-leading research group led by Mihaela van der Schaar, John Humphrey Plummer Professor of Machine Learning, AI and Medicine at the University of Cambridge. This exposure to the potential of AI combined with experience teaching at Harvard Business School convinced him there was a role for the technology to play in promoting one of the more human aspects of business — culture. This is important because, while there has traditionally been a lot of talk about what culture needs to be, there has been a lack of tools for helping organizations move from where they are to where they want to be. Since such a shift tends to require repeated nudges in terms of behaviors and attitudes, the usual training approaches of courses and “off-sites” or “away days” tend not to be effective. So Rashbass explored the idea of whether AI could act as a sort of “coach in the moment.”
He is not the only one to see how AI could play a role in coaching. As reported in the Financial Times recently, there has been a surge in offerings that to various degrees aim to democratise the sort of service that has been available to senior executives for some time. But Rashbass believes that ScultureAI, the business he has founded with his son, Elie, and others, has something special to offer at a time when so many organizations are struggling with culture as a result of shifts in working habits brought about by the pandemic lockdowns, wider societal changes and the increasing need for adaptability in the face of greater uncertainty and complexity.
Pointing out that office workers typically are engaged in hundreds of digital interactions in a day, he suggests that by becoming involved in just a small percentage of them the technology can help ensure that employees are thinking about the right things as they go about their tasks. As he sees it, adding his technology to emails and other methods of communication effectively invites a coach into the conversation — much like a golf caddy with a golfer. “It’s using AI to make humans better,” he said in a recent interview. In this he is adopting a similar theme too Capgemini’s Farri and Rosari. Clearly frustrated by what they regard as an “unbalanced” narrative focused on productivity, they insist that for those prepared to switch their mindset, AI brings about “a great opportunity to unlock value rather than just cut costs.”
These are worthy aims that will no doubt resonate with some forward-thinking leaders. Sadly, though, the allure of bots as replacements for real people is likely to be more appealing to many others than the idea of co-pilots, co-thinkers or whatever.