Business Leaders Must Adapt in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been rapidly infiltrating our lives. From chatbots replying to emails to self-driving cars, AI is everywhere. Much of the attention and discussion so far has been around the amazing output AI generators are capable of and how many jobs will be lost because of this, but business leaders need to focus on the need for adaptation. Companies and organizations must be prepared to adjust their strategies to keep up with the rapid advances in artificial intelligence.

The Last Invention Humans Will Create

I believe artificial intelligence is the most significant technological advancement since the invention of the internet. In the last 25 years or so, it has been by far the most significant technological advancement.? AI has been applied countless times, from automating mundane tasks to providing information-driven decisions. Its potential is mind-boggling, and I'm super excited about AI.

There's usually a moment with these types of advances when everyone wakes up and takes notice, and that was when OpenAI and ChatGPT came on the scene.? Suddenly, AI was capable of generating text that was almost indistinguishable from human-written content.

This is a new era for artificial intelligence, and I think it has the potential to revolutionize industries. We are just beginning to see what AI can do, with more and more applications being created every day. The possibilities are virtually endless. Now everyone's blown away by the capability of these AI generators and for good reason.?

About a decade ago, while at a university, I heard someone say that artificial intelligence would be the last invention humans would have to create because, from that point on, we'll just ask AI to invent things for us, and it will.? It's a stunning thing to think about. ? We are on the brink of a new era where AI will be so pervasive that it will become an integral part of our everyday lives.

The implications of this are both exciting and scary. On the one hand, there is immense potential for AI to bring about positive change – from improving healthcare delivery to automating processes – but on the other, AI could lead to massive job loss and a further widening of economic inequality.? Companies need to be aware of these possibilities and plan accordingly.

People who are quick to embrace fearful thinking quickly start thinking about the negative ways people will be impacted.? We'll still need people in business and society for a long time.? We must adapt our thinking and practices to this changing landscape.

Prepare Your Employees for Change

The most important aspect of adapting quickly is preparing your employees for change. Employees need to be aware that changes are coming and that they may need to learn new skills or apply existing skills in new ways.

Perhaps the best phrase I've heard about the impact of artificial intelligence on jobs in the last four months is, "You're not going to be replaced by AI. You will be replaced by a human who uses AI better than you do." Yes, you can ask an AI generator to do things, but from what I've seen so far, the best output comes from when humans use AI as a base, and then they build on that.

All innovation is on top of someone else's innovation.? The innovator takes an idea, something someone else created, and springboards from there. AI is no different. It's up to us to make sure that the technology is used in a way that creates positive outcomes rather than negative ones. Now we have an innovation that makes every other innovation move way, way faster, and that's why we're having such an exciting--and for some people overwhelming--moment in history.

AI is going to move things way faster than before, and things are already moving pretty fast. That increase in speed is going to lead to change or generate even faster technological advances and movements in the world.? So not only do we have to adapt, but we have to adapt faster than before.

Let me illustrate a bit. If I use my mobile phone to write an amazing business plan (because phones aren't really phones anymore; they are computers that happen to make phone calls), my phone is as dumb as it was before I wrote the business plan. The phone did not learn anything.

Now with artificial intelligence, the AI actually learned how to do a business plan. If I have that business plan online and someone wants to do a similar business plan, they could ask their AI generator, and it will give them some of what I created. It's going to do it to a higher level, even.

So now technology has the capability of learning. That's what's scary to a lot of people because now technology is going to learn faster than you or me, and everyone's going to have access through OpenAI or AI. They're going to have access to all the inventions in the world really, really fast.

Up until recently, if someone invented something in India or Italy, or Mexico, the probability of me using that innovation in the US was very low. Now I just go to ChatGPT, and if someone invented something at 2 p.m. in Mexico, I could get that advantage at 3 p.m. in the US. The speed of putting things together and the learning of technology is way, way faster than human beings are capable of on their own.

Too often, when new technologies arrive, people get intimidated by what they don't know and avoid dealing with it.? If you're in business, this is the worst possible time for you to avoid the emergence of artificial intelligence. ? AI is here, and it's not going away anytime soon. We just need to figure out how to use it responsibly and efficiently.

By focusing on adaptation, education, and communication, you'll be better positioned to take advantage of the opportunities this new technology can bring.? It's important to remember that artificial intelligence is here to augment, not replace, the skills of your workforce. As a leader, it's essential that you open up a dialogue with your employees and find ways to use their existing skills in new ways. That's how you can create a better future for everyone.

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