Fortune — CEO Daily: A.I. Expectations
The important insights shared below by Alan Murray and Jonathan Vanian of Fortune, raise a fundamental issue of how quickly CEO’s are willing to play a role that neither they, nor their organizations are used to in order to drive radical change.
“A survey from MIT Sloan Management Review and Boston Consulting Group that found most companies are failing in applying artificial intelligence
The survey, based on responses from nearly 2,500 executives, found that seven out of ten companies report little to no impact from their A.I. projects so far.
But the survey also found a key difference between the relatively few “winners” and the numerous “losers” in this category. The difference: the “winners” were those using technology to upend current business practices. They were the ones willing to, in effect, disrupt themselves.
It isn’t a tool that can be plugged into the organization by the CIO. Rather, it raises the possibility of transforming the entire company, and therefore has to be driven from the top — by the CEO.
It has to be done by a team that has the capacity to reimagine their most practiced and beloved methods. And it has to be done in a culture that is willing to embrace radical change. In short, technology is the easy part. Reimagining and reorienting the business is what’s hard.”
The current enterprise model facilitates a leadership structure where decisions on the way we work and tools we adopt are delegated down to levels of management that are not usually comfortable initiating radical change. We are working in an entirely new paradigm where a radical shift in the way that we approach our work is the only way that organizations can join the 3 out of 10 companies that seem to be on the right track here.
“Reimagining and reorienting the business” cannot be delegated if transformation must happen now for companies to thrive and survive. Disrupting current business practices requires the CEO to get involved in certain buying decisions currently made by other leaders and visibly champion adoption within the organization.
CEO’s today must both make the decision to upend critical business practices and champion the adoption. The popular “opt in” culture where a minority of high performers leverage available AI driven tools is a significant barrier to winning.
What we sometimes forget in today’s culture is that as leaders we are the keepers ultimately responsible for shepherding our people and enterprise to success. We forget that leadership sometimes necessitates mandated action and the clarity of true accountability. We forget that holding others accountable is a demonstration of caring.
At Indiggo, we believe strongly in flat, collaborative, empowering cultures, but we also advocate strongly for a select number of vital changes to be top down and clearly driven by the CEO.
#ROL #ReturnOnLeadership #AI #DigitalTransformation #CEO #Leadership
