“There’s probably not one person on the planet who hasn’t faced some existential, at least question, the last three years. Do I want to keep doing this work anymore? Why am I here? We’ve all had to go inwardly to our very core at some point during these last three years... And at the same time, technology marches on, as Kevin Kelly would say. Technology doesn’t necessarily have a conscience; it just keeps on marching forward. So, how do we reconcile humanity and technology in a way that is beneficial for all of us?”
Tony O'Driscoll is the co-author of the new release, Everyday Superhero: How You Can Inspire Everyone and Create Real Change at Work. His role as adjunct professor at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and Pratt School of Engineering afford him the unique opportunity to apply cutting-edge academic research to increasingly complex business challenges. He has spent the bulk of his professional and academic career at the nexus of business, innovation, technology, change, and learning, creating and implementing strategies that enable organizations to realize the full potential of their most valuable asset: human beings.
There are few people in the world who have thought as deeply about the interface of technology and human organizations and imagined what the future models might be for how organizations will evolve than Tony.
Tony joined me on the Outthinkers podcast to discuss how the key digital-age differentiator is not technology, but people.
- AI will help us to do the impossible: Science asks us to take the unknown and reduce it to a repeatable process or a law. But in many areas, we haven't been able to do this because we don't yet understand all the possible progression paths whereby something might become plausible and provable. Tony explains that machine intelligence will expand our scientific capabilities by processing a much broader range of possible progression paths and coming up with solutions that we may never have considered. For example, when AlphaGo, the AI player of the strategy game Go, played against a grandmaster, by the fourth move the machine had come up with a new legal move that no human had ever tried before. If we allow machines to do the data processing work that they do well, our ability to leverage technology to do the impossible will increase.
- Transformation starts with people: Organizations typically try to drive transformation by focusing on one of three levers–structure, technology, or process. However, if these initiatives are imposed onto employees, disengagement increases 3X because people do not feel a part of the transformation. Tony explains that belief and behavior must come before structures, technologies, or processes. When tasked with a transformation effort, first consider these three questions: 1.) What paradigms do we need to adopt and believe? 2.) How do we need to shift our behavior to be in accordance with that new belief or paradigm? 3.) How might we want to think about structure/tech/process? Reversing the order of things will put people at the center of your transformation efforts.
- Organizations must shift to a complex adaptive system: The global organizational landscape has shifted to a new paradigm. Fear, uncertainty, and doubt are at an all-time high. Companies and their leadership must act as an ever-evolving organism that continuously create, deliver, and disseminate value. All stakeholders in the ecosystem want it to stay alive and are willing to contribute their part to make that happen.
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1y"So, how do we reconcile humanity and technology in a way that is beneficial for all of us?” Maybe the most important question of our time. Thanks for the thought-provoking piece.
Professor, Research Fellow and Academic Director at Duke University
1yThanks for the stimulating sense making session Kaihan Krippendorff