AI is truly the shiny object that everyone seems to be chasing. Creative professionals are (probably rightfully) worried that AI will take their jobs (Copywriter Annabel Beales: “Just put it in ChatGPT”). Others are pumping the brakes (Klarna’s CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski: “…cost unfortunately seems to have been a too predominant evaluation factor when organizing this, what you end up having is lower quality”).
Meanwhile, questions remain about the true beneficiaries of AI. Does it help make workers more efficient, or help companies replace them entirely? For instance, a recent Microsoft study demonstrated that an AI coding assistant provided greater productivity benefits to junior developers—a finding that could bolster employers who cite AI as a reason to cut more experienced (i.e., higher cost) employees in favor of less experienced (i.e., cheaper) employees aided by AI. Perhaps unsurprisingly, early studies also suggest that AI usage may contribute to worsening critical thinking skills. Some companies are hiring humans to fix AI errors, which quickly becomes more costly than having humans do the work in the first place.
Professor and Author Cal Newport offers sound advice on the polarizing AI landscape:
- Tune out both the most heated and the most dismissive rhetoric.
- Focus on tangible changes in areas that you care about that really do seem connected to AI—read widely and ask people you trust about what they’re seeing.
- Beyond that, however, follow AI news with a large grain of salt. All of this is too new for anyone to really understand what they’re saying.
AI is important. But we don’t yet fully know why.
Business Takeaway: Three things seem to be true: (1) AI is here to stay; (2) as to the particulars, much depends on the industry you are in; (3) the productivity and profitability gap will be between those companies who have intentionally leveraged AI and those who have not. How have you implemented AI in your business, and was it impulsive or intentional?