Business Challenges in 2024; Agile Tenacity in Leadership; Do you really want AI to write and uphold the law?!
Today I want to cover
AI and Content,
a Leadership concept I’ve been advocating for and now there is a name
GenAI and The Law
AI and Content
I’ve been thinking about the content I want to create this year. And how the way we use AI in our work is a defining issue of 2024.
I still think that AI will not take away professional jobs, but will change the way people work. AI can take on some of the research and some of the boring, repetitive tasks that have been traditionally done by entry-level professionals or support staff. People sometimes underestimate how much support staff activity is needed to make professional work high quality; trainees, research assistants, and so on. A lot of that can be done with AI, just as secretarial work (dictation, typing) has been taken on by technology over the decades.
The basis of all my content, including my drive for writing, is sharing my perspective based on a thirty-year, uniquely varied, high-flying career. What I say cannot be read in books because I share lived experience not what I’ve read.
And as it’s my lived experience, by definition, what I write cannot be written by ChatGPT or its competitors. (Sure, that is until it digests all my writing and reads my mind.)
As I am determined to FOCUS this year, to add only what is needed and subtract everything else, I have decided that anything that can be written by Chat GPT will not be appearing here.
Lessons for Leaders will continue to be based on my own experience and thoughts, and I will only use AI to help me brainstorm ideas or do some research on Microsoft Copilot. To be honest, so far I have rejected almost every idea any AI suggested, but they have spurred me onto other topics.
That’s my transparency promise to you, and if it changes I will let you know. Oh, and I do love to doodle with AI. (This was done on Copilot.)
Key challenges facing business leaders in 2024
I’ve been looking at business and leadership predictions over the past week, and these are the ones I find most important:
Continued economic volatility,
Political and social upheaval (critical elections in a large part of the democratic world),
Technological acceleration (hello, AI),
infrastructure problems,
People and staffing issues (layoffs and talent shortages), hybrid work, skills first over degrees hiring,
Climate (including the immediate issues such as extreme weather, as 2023 was the hottest year on record)
Geopolitics: continuing and expanding wars, trade wars and issues, polarisation
There were always going to be swings back and forth on hybrid and remote working before things stabilised, and I’ve predicted no going back to pre-pandemic in-office work practices.
Agile Tenacity
Over the past few years, as uncertainty and constant change that makes it necessary to adapt became the key concern for business leaders, it became clear that many leaders struggled. If you have spent most of your career managing to plans, it is not easy to switch to a different mode of operating that relies heavily on scenario planning instead of devising and executing long-term plans. Not to mention having to react swiftly to various crises such as lockdowns, serious supply chain disruptions, or rising interest rates.
Many businesses have been burnt by multiple crises over the past years, and only the ones able to respond not just strategically but quickly emerged intact or stronger.
This requires a huge shift in thinking and behaviour by leaders.
I recently came upon this wording, Agile Tenacity, as a name for a leadership concept by IMD professors. It is a good description for a way of leading and managing I believe is essential in these times of uncertainty. Here’s my spin on what it means, based on how I lead in uncertain times, and what I advise.
I have often advocated over the past years for a duality in thinking and action that requires flexibility and strength at the same time.
You need to be able to react and adapt your strategy and operations without delay – but at the same time you have to stick to your values and you cannot just change the culture of your business overnight. Having anchors is important when everything is uncertain – they are there to give you grounding not to hold you back. Values and culture have to act as such. So does the overall purpose of the organisation.
It is important to have guardrails when the circumstances require that you make things up as you go. Which is what happens sometimes. Like when countries suddenly went into full pandemic lockdown.
Uncertain times naturally bring great opportunities too. Being able to spot them and act on them requires leaders to be plugged into the world around them and not just their closest competition, to be curious, and most importantly be able to discard old ideas to make space for new ones.
This, I think, is where many go wrong.
“I’ve watched too many leaders shield themselves from task conflict. As they gain power, they tune out boat-rockers and listen to bootlickers. They become politicians, surrounding themselves with agreeable yes-men and becoming more susceptible to seduction by sycophants. Research reveals that when their firms perform poorly, CEOs who indulge flattery and conformity become overconfident. They stick to their existing strategic plans instead of changing course – which sets them on a collision course with failure.”
– from the book Think Again by Adam Grant
If you feel dizzy from the change and uncertainty, remember,