Humanizing leadership in the AI world
Organizations have changed tremendously over the past few decades. Reflecting back 20-30 years reminds us of structured, clear definitions, and a predictable and stable business world. That world is gone now because of technological advancements, regulations, and globalization, today we have a strikingly different organization with new assets. Having the right people is amongst the greatest assets. If you have an organization full of on-fire people, then you have leadership organization for today. The changing world of work thus, has immense implications on leadership, especially in a scenario when we are transitioning to Artificial Intelligence.
How Leadership Expectations are Changing
The modern-day organization needs people who are empowered, trusted, collaborative, authentic, people who have found their Mojo, purpose, self-regulated, smart, risk-taking…a whole different set of attributes are needed. At the core, what is required is an attitudinal shift to navigate a world systematically driving through change. We need to shift our thinking from “leaders of change” to “leaders in change”. There is a huge difference, the latter places the center of gravity back on the individual. It raises questions of not, “what are you driving”, but questions of “how are you operating”. We must realize that this shift is a part of a larger transition.
What will be the nature of work that will be left for us, if there is any work left for us at all?
This is an emerging concern as AI discussions abound. Work that will be left for us will be the difficult stuff- involving a lot of judgment, creativity, etc. As we transition, we are going from a world where the human-element was a nice-to-have add-on to work tasks, to a world where the human element becomes the very essence of work.
How can you build the human element?
We can establish a connection between leadership and flourish, based on five domain areas:
Play to Strengths: We must ask ourselves a simple question- “What will help us prove ourselves more, knowing our strengths, or our weaknesses?”