LEADERSHIP IN QUESTION
hence for all leaders, as it helps them to optimise the means and ways of performing. The advantages provided by AI are undeniable and not open to discussion. What is questionable, on the other hand, is the extent to which the obvious benefits of NOI risk being offset by its possible negative effects. By amplifying almost infinitely one of the aspects of our power to live – our reason – and by delegating to a machine this ability and the control we may have over it, we must ask if we are creating a monster more powerful than ourselves, capable of acting independently of our own volition. It will behove the users of this extraordinary tool to make the right use of it. We all know the story of the sorcerer’s apprentice: leaders will need to ensure that they don’t inadvertently pass on to a machine that outpowers them those responsibilities that should remain theirs. Strategy & AI under the microscope AI is a technology that will change everything that connects human beings with the generation of knowledge. Printing changed the way knowledge was spread. The first, second and third industrial revolutions changed the physical capabilities of human beings. Properly managed, AI will enhance the capabilities of our brains to an extent that we cannot yet entirely imagine. Leadership and AI might be the real challenge for the survival of human beings. Therefore, a strategy for the adoption and development of AI is a necessity, requiring new styles of leadership. Its main challenge is the human/machine interface and its societal impact. This kind of challenge is not new; it has been at the core of the development of the most significant technological breakthroughs. Let’s look at the impact of AI on the way strategy is designed, formulated and implemented. The purpose of strategic decision‑making is to create value for an organisation’s stakeholders at a certain place in a certain point in time and guarantee that it is competitive for the future. It is an intellectual
process where AI has a role to play. Value creation starts with a constraint: namely, generating value for the investors while enhancing benefits for society. The value creation for shareholders comes from profitable growth, while the benefits for society are measured through TSI, or total societal impact. Profitable growth starts with the creation of value for customers. For B2C businesses, it means providing better customer experience (CX) and in B2B making customers more competitive. AI helps reinvent CX; it also increases the business model’s efficiency, boosting productivity and making mass customisation – ie personalised offerings at low cost – easier. Moreover, in a VUTCA world, AI extends the capacity of scenario building through using digital twins in various domains: products, processes, systems, organisations and environments. These AI-augmented simulation-based digital twins are easily accessible. ‘Copilots’ or generative AI tools can help employees work more efficiently and concentrate on higher value tasks. As well as off-the-shelf options, it’s possible to choose either to integrate available models with proprietary data to obtain more customised results, or to build a foundation model from scratch. Such models make the analysis of possible future scenarios and potential responses to them much easier and faster, significantly increasing the span of control. The scope is much larger than the one left to the human mind, but we are the ones who will have to make the decisions because we need to bear in mind that “machines inform, humans decide”. There is one unavoidable condition, however, in terms of the most beneficial use of AI: we need to ensure data quality to fuel models. Besides the quality of data, the use of AI is not without multiple risks. These need to be carefully anticipated; malicious use, intellectual property and security threats are among the prevailing issues associated with this new kind of technology. Fraud and cyber attacks can have devastating effects, while the speed to scale AI must be balanced with judicious risk management. Putting all these pieces together to achieve new and solid constructions will demand an innovative breed of leader with an excellent mastery of the human-machine interface at the highest cognitive and emotional levels. AI has the capacity to enrich strategy formulation and implementation – provided it is carefully monitored by human intellect.
BIOGRAPHIES Pierre Casse (pictured left) is the leadership chair at Iedc-Bled School of Management in Slovenia and the author of Leadership without Concessions and Leadership for a New World . Paul George Claudel held the post of director of human resources at several large industrial corporations before becoming a professor, teaching philosophy and leadership at various business schools and universities. Maurice A Saias is a retired university professor; he began by teaching economics, decision theory and statistics and has been involved in executive education in 55 countries across Europe, North America, Latin America, Asia and South Africa
Ambition • ISSUE 5 • 2025 37
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