“AI is not only changing the bottom of the org chart but also reshaping the top,” a recent Harvard Business Review article notes. The article argues that to understand how artificial intelligence (AI) will impact leadership, we need to “shift from seeing AI as a tool (or range of tools) to a leadership challenge—if not the defining leadership challenge of our times.”
The book, “The Octopus Organization: A Guide to Thriving in a World of Continuous Transformation,” by Phil Le-Brun and Jana Werner, has an interesting perspective on the leadership challenges with AI. They found leaders frustrated in their efforts to leverage AI. They felt their teams weren’t imaginative. Le-Brun and Werner identified two new AI forces causing this lack of imagination:
1. AI capabilities are changing so fast. Topdown decision-making models are too slow. By the time decisions are made, the conditions have changed and the decision may not be appropriate.
2. The cost of delivery has collapsed, making it difficult to build prototypes to test the way we usually do before committing to action.
Imaginative and creative talent is needed to counteract AI in these changing and challenging times. As the authors point out, “When permission takes longer than execution,” talent is hard to keep. They advocate that the traditional operating systems need to change—now.
AN ORGANIZATIONAL SHIFT
After reading “Remarkably Bright Creatures” and watching the documentary, My Octopus Teacher, I was intrigued by the metaphor of the octopus organization. Le-Brun and Werner explain how the octopus is an “intelligent animal that doesn’t route every sensory input back to a central brain. Instead, two-thirds of its neurons live directly in its arms, empowering them to sense, react, and make autonomous decisions at the perimeter. Organizations need the same biological shift.” Their conclusion: “You don’t need to find more imaginative people. You need to design an environment where the ‘arms’ of your organization are trusted and equipped to act on what they see and imagine.”
This is empowerment at its best. The people closest to the work should be making the decisions. Howard Behar, former Starbucks president and an authority on servant leadership, says it best: “The person who sweeps the floor chooses the broom.” By investing in the right people and the right guardrails (such as training, clearly defined scopes of influence, etc.), the organization will be nimbler and faster to react to market changes.
Are you ready to build an octopus organization?