Leverage Your Human Intelligence

Jun 21

How much of the value you add could be handled well enough by AI within a few years? Ikea is retraining its call centre staff to help customers design solutions for their homes rather than handling run-of-the-mill problems. Those are taken care of by an AI solution. This is an illuminating example of how AI can actually make our work more, not less, meaningful. It will handle issues that can be solved with IFTT, leaving us humans free to focus on work that requires creative solutioning and emotional maturity. There is no substitute, as yet, for the wisdom that comes from experience. Wisdom that guides you in distilling insight out of all the data. The wisdom to choose to engage with the people across the proverbial table when being right is not the answer that will move things forward. This is where I see us humans having the advantage, probably for a very long time to come.

What are the skills, then, that you can leverage to keep your leadership truly human?

Offer the gift of feeling heard

Do you remember the story about the Google engineer who raised the alarm to warn us all that the AI they had created was a being with emotions? Or the film "Her" by Spike Jonze? People can come to believe there is an emotional creature hiding in the machine when it seems to understand what they mean, and is willing to listen to them for as long as it takes. This shows that it is often more important to give people the space to talk than to tell them what we think about it all. Don't worry about not adding value when you don't impart your wisdom. You are giving the gift of your undivided attention, which makes people feel validated. That is treasure.

Beware of assumptions

Frustratingly any AI tool requires a lot of context for its answer to actually be useful. People - who built these tools of course - are no different. Is your idea meeting with resistance? Seek to understand what concerns the other person and what they want to achieve. You can probably work out a solution that gets you where you want to go while addressing valid concerns. You may even be grateful to the doubter for spotting a risk you hadn't factored in. Or maybe they simply didn't fully understand the implications until you talked them through it all.

Stay human in your communication

An AI-generated response can come across impersonal. You'll want to adapt it to suit your style if you're going to integrate some of its content in your communication. It's a good reminder to consider the delivery of your message as much as its content. How are you getting your audience's attention? How are you addressing what they care about? Will they understand why and how this matters to them and to the greater good? Build bridges for your audience, make it easy for them to understand and get on board with your ask. Make them care, and care about their view.

Learn as you go

This is the exception where I'd counsel you to be like an AI tool: keep filing every experience away for future reference, and learn from it. Make a habit of scheduling a brief block of time once a week to reflect on what you've learnt that week that will help you make good choices next time. Experience alone does not generate learning: only reflection on experience does that.

I can help you reflect and build new habits. Get in touch!