You’re naming a contradiction a lot of people already understand without needing it translated into consultant dialect.
Leaders say they want flexibility, trust, innovation, and AI adoption.
Then they fund surveillance, strip away autonomy, and act confused when employees don’t welcome the next wave of tech with gratitude.
That is not confusion.
That is cause and effect.
The part I especially like is the implied point that resistance to AI is not always ignorance or fear of change. Sometimes it is pattern recognition. People have learned, correctly, that when leadership says a tool is here to “help,” it too often means more control, more measurement, and one more way to treat human beings like suspicious machinery.
In my opinion lack of empathy may be the problem. Labour vs. capital pendulum is for now on the capital side. So the power a CEO has, knowing they have the upper hand and then the lack of empathy add up to... let's treat people like they have absolutely no say in any of this AND like they will take it as is. If the pendulum ever swings the other way these companies may go out of business not being able to hire anyone.
Didn't realize VC money was this deep into surveillance tech. It's a funded ecosystem optimizing for control. No wonder employees don't trust the next tool leadership rolls out.
Interesting point, and well made. Why would the rank and file trust being mandated to be AI first after gaining a healthy distrust and skepticism from the same leadership that took a surveillance first approach during COVID?
In some cases, both. But more often, it’s fear. This is a trust issue, and a systemic one: who do we promote as leaders, how are they trained, and how far removed are they from the actual work? And sure, not all leaders (just like not all men). But that’s like saying only one of these chocolates has poo in it: you’re still not eating the box. As long as leadership keeps chasing speed, profit, and control without understanding people, this divide won’t close. The structure protects itself.
Both. They become more stupid, and that makes them more stubborn. Why? A lack of standards to stick to. Why? To be more flexible to changes. But if they don’t have standards from the beginning (and nobody does at the beginning), they become stupid in the early stages and only later may become wiser, or more stagnating.
About the AI and CEOs, it looks like for now and maybe that happening always with disrupting, there are 3 categories, 1) those who jump on hype and managing to have gains or failed, 2) those who are in denial and failing slowly, 3) those who see clearly purpose of what they can achieve with that and usually do that. A lot of responsibility for adopting new things properly lies on team they have.
Neither. They run businesses where the Northstar (objective function) is profit. As long as we have the greenback as the benchmark for success, we will have algorithms that go solve for it. You can imagine that regulation arbitraged (as you mentioned antiquatedly called country) is a great play right now (stirring the pot in the us helps the volatility tade too). You can imagine where this is going unless new, improved Northstars are found to operate organizations.
Both!
You’re naming a contradiction a lot of people already understand without needing it translated into consultant dialect.
Leaders say they want flexibility, trust, innovation, and AI adoption.
Then they fund surveillance, strip away autonomy, and act confused when employees don’t welcome the next wave of tech with gratitude.
That is not confusion.
That is cause and effect.
The part I especially like is the implied point that resistance to AI is not always ignorance or fear of change. Sometimes it is pattern recognition. People have learned, correctly, that when leadership says a tool is here to “help,” it too often means more control, more measurement, and one more way to treat human beings like suspicious machinery.
In my opinion lack of empathy may be the problem. Labour vs. capital pendulum is for now on the capital side. So the power a CEO has, knowing they have the upper hand and then the lack of empathy add up to... let's treat people like they have absolutely no say in any of this AND like they will take it as is. If the pendulum ever swings the other way these companies may go out of business not being able to hire anyone.
Will the pendulum ever swing back, I wonder?
Didn't realize VC money was this deep into surveillance tech. It's a funded ecosystem optimizing for control. No wonder employees don't trust the next tool leadership rolls out.
Yes, it's sad.
Interesting point, and well made. Why would the rank and file trust being mandated to be AI first after gaining a healthy distrust and skepticism from the same leadership that took a surveillance first approach during COVID?
In some cases, both. But more often, it’s fear. This is a trust issue, and a systemic one: who do we promote as leaders, how are they trained, and how far removed are they from the actual work? And sure, not all leaders (just like not all men). But that’s like saying only one of these chocolates has poo in it: you’re still not eating the box. As long as leadership keeps chasing speed, profit, and control without understanding people, this divide won’t close. The structure protects itself.
Some of them have natural causes on their side to explain the resistance to change.
P.S. Trying PC about age ;).
Both. They become more stupid, and that makes them more stubborn. Why? A lack of standards to stick to. Why? To be more flexible to changes. But if they don’t have standards from the beginning (and nobody does at the beginning), they become stupid in the early stages and only later may become wiser, or more stagnating.
About the AI and CEOs, it looks like for now and maybe that happening always with disrupting, there are 3 categories, 1) those who jump on hype and managing to have gains or failed, 2) those who are in denial and failing slowly, 3) those who see clearly purpose of what they can achieve with that and usually do that. A lot of responsibility for adopting new things properly lies on team they have.
Neither. They run businesses where the Northstar (objective function) is profit. As long as we have the greenback as the benchmark for success, we will have algorithms that go solve for it. You can imagine that regulation arbitraged (as you mentioned antiquatedly called country) is a great play right now (stirring the pot in the us helps the volatility tade too). You can imagine where this is going unless new, improved Northstars are found to operate organizations.