My Top 5 Predictions (and Priorities!) For AI Leaders in 2024

I’ll be honest: I don’t like making predictions.?

How often do you go back to see if your predictions became a reality? And even if you do, does it matter whether you were right or wrong???

What’s more important than predictions are the priorities that they create. It’s thinking about the changes that are coming—and how best to prepare for them—that matters most.?

A year ago, we could not have predicted just how much generative AI would transform the landscape. And while I wish I had a crystal ball that could tell me what the technologies of 2024 will look like, I don’t. I know two things, though: AI will only improve, and we need to stay up to date on models and technology if we want to remain ahead of the curve.

With that in mind, here are five predictions and priorities to keep in mind as we head into the new year.?

My Top 5 Predictions and Priorities for 2024?

1. AI Will Provide Significant Competitive Advantage

This might be obvious, but AI will continue to be a game changer to those who use it strategically. In the new year, many organizations will go live with new implementations. We’ll say to ourselves, “How do they do that?!”?

Your Next Priority:

• Get your C-suite involved. Over 40 percent of 80 CIOs and other IT leaders we surveyed in October said they aren’t using AI. But 2024 is the year to get down and dirty with AI. Bring your C-suite in.
• Focus on strategic efforts to build AI capabilities. Don’t create analysis-paralysis by generating a huge list of individual use cases. What is most essential? Recognize the patterns of capabilities you need to develop and look for ways to accumulate them. A great place to start would be with a private, generative AI tool—like Claude or ChatGPT. Put it on a private server, like in AWS. It’s safer than using the external versions.?

2. AI Will Become a Trusted Resource

Right now, there's mass distrust in generative AI—especially of the major tech and AI companies and platforms. For various reasons, we expect our AI technology to be perfect, even though humans are not! 2024 will prompt us to learn more about what AI can do and respect what it can’t.?

We tend to position “made by humans” against “made by AI,” and place a natural premium on the former. The new year will encourage a value shift in this because soon “made by AI”–-or at least “assisted by AI”–-may prove to be better than what we can make as humans alone.?

This is not to discredit the work of humans without AI. If anything, I think this label may become an interesting marker of artisan work in some creative spaces. But by and large, when it comes to knowledge work inside of organizations, “built with AI”—in full transparency—will be a marker of excellence and trust.?

Your Next Priority:

• Define “responsible AI”—and build it in from the beginning—to create trust. This applies both internally to employees and externally to customers and partners. This could look like:AI literacy and training?Clear and updated policies on usePolicies around cyber, legal, privacy, and data useTransparency on when AI is being used and with what data

3. AI Agents Will Emerge as Unexpected Allies

AI agents will soon be positioned as co-pilots that can take on more and more as we learn to use and trust them. (If you’d like to learn more about AI agents, check out Bill Gates’s article , published earlier this year.)?

Your Next Priority:

• Identify where you can offload work to AI agents. I’ve already incorporated AI agents into my workflow by using them to research and book trips , I also use them to write and send emails with the help of an email client, Superhuman, whose knowledge base includes all of my emails from the past few years. I put in a couple of ideas, and it generates an email from me in my voice. It gets better with each use.???

4. AI Will Make People More Valuable, Not Less

There's a lot of concern about whether AI will take away jobs. This is absolutely understandable, mainly because specific tasks will not exist (or will exist in smaller numbers) in a year. But it doesn't necessarily mean that those people go away.?

As AI enters the workplace, we'll see an automatization of routine. This will free people up to focus on higher-value work that they—as knowledge workers—want to be able to do! The democratization of generative AI allows workers to leverage critical thinking: They now have access to information and insights that were once held only by an inner sanctum of analysts.?

Your Next Priority:

• Make sure you're committed to your people. Address the distrust that they have about AI taking away their jobs, and be honest about what and how their jobs will change. Emphasize your commitment to them as valuable members of the organization.
• Let knowledge workers redefine their tasks. Instead of trying to control AI centrally, make the tools widely available. Facilitate AI training so that you and your teams have confidence that they use AI safely and responsibly. Let your workers figure it out themselves. Give your people agency and trust that they can use it correctly. This will unleash the generative power of AI and will drive both strategic changes and huge transformation.

5.? AI Will Transform Transformation.

To best frame AI, let’s turn to Harry Potter.?

In a lot of ways, AI is like a magic wand. A non-magician or muggle doesn’t know what to do with it. You have to learn how to use it. You have to go to Hogwarts.

We have to develop the capabilities and harness the creativity. Transformation is limited only by these two things.?

AI transformation is very different from other kinds of transformation because it’s so democratized. You also don’t have to invest much upfront to see AI’s benefit. We rarely have this many opportunities to explore growth and transformational change without huge investments, time, people, or money.

Your Next Priority:

• Make every knowledge worker a transformation leader. The democratization and decentralization of technology have enormous implications. But although there’s so much to say about rights, access, and governance, it’s ultimately about putting the guardrails in place and then letting go of the controls.?

Bonus Prediction: Leadership Itself Will Change

Generative AI will shift the focus from managing tasks to managing people. Until recently, you were promoted because you knew how to do the job better than anyone else. But now, with AI, everyone can quickly get up to speed and do the job well—without you.

This has many implications for how we identify and encourage people along their career trajectory: How do potential leaders encourage psychological safety? How do they build trust among one another? How do they create change?

Are managers collectively ready for this? No. Leaders have never had the privilege of managing superhumans before! That’s why I think it’s wise to make generative AI leadership development a top priority for 2024. Knowing that this change is coming is key and getting ready for it is essential.

Need Support?

In 2024, I’m expanding my offerings from speaking and executive workshops to include generative AI strategic audits and assessments. If you would like some support in planning or reviewing your generative AI strategy for the year ahead, please get in touch!?

Your Turn

What are some of your priorities for 2024, particularly regarding generative AI and disruptive transformation? How do you think about them? Why are they a priority for you?