Imagine you find yourself in 1970 with no knowledge of the future. As if by magic, a genie appears and says it’s going to give you two glimpses of the years to come, and then ask you to make a prediction.
It shows you new electronic calculators, which became available for ordinary people to buy in the early 70s.
Then it shows you early spreadsheets, which appeared around the 1980 mark.
Finally, the genie issues its challenge: predict the future of the accountancy profession.
When calculators and then spreadsheets appeared, people were quick to predict the end of accountancy. Why would you need somebody with green eye shades to do the adding up if you can do it yourself with a calculator? they asked. And why would you need an accountant to analyse and aggregate and work out ratios and so on when a spreadsheet can do it? Accountancy, they declared, was dead in the water.
The prediction was, of course, totally wrong. Today, partners at the biggest accountancy firms often earn seven figures.
So what are we to think about today’s headlines predicting this and that about the effects of AI?
It’s interesting, if you read newspapers from across the political spectrum, as I do deliberately, that you will see a wide range of predictions for AI and what it will do to jobs and industries. If you look at a range of media, rather than living inside the bubble of one or another, you can see people talking their own ideological or commercial book.
There have always been people quick to predict the end of civilisation, and there have always been people quick to suggest that their preferred technology – invariably the one they are selling – will lead to some new human utopia. We ought to treat these prognosticators with scepticism, or more cheerfully, simply see them as the entertainers they are.
OK, but if we can’t make our plans on the basis of punditry, what can we do to navigate in this world? Are there some basic attitudes that will enable us to meet the future and ideally to co-create our bit of it, or at least influence how it unfolds in a way that enables us not only to survive, but hopefully to thrive and flourish?
Well, how about these for starters?
- Recommit to understanding value. Really deeply understand what value is for those others that we want to exchange it with. In other words, know your customer. It’s a timeless principle that is unlikely to be changed by the advent of any particular technology.
- Don’t forget the human. I’ve often mentioned Naisbitt’s idea of high tech, high touch: that as technology becomes more sophisticated, it becomes easier for people to be alienated unless matched by an increasingly sophisticated touch. I find it extremely hard to think that that is going to change, since it depends on human nature.
- Accept that your personal lifelong learning curve has got steeper. We have to think with more of a return-on-investment head about our personal commitment to keep up. Return on investment follows a J-curve. You have to spend first. What are you, your teams, and your organisation doing to really learn about the technologies that are coming and to explore their possibilities?
Final thought: There’s a surprisingly large number of AI consultants out there who claim to have mastered the implications of this technology and seem to know all about how it’s going to help your business.
Ask yourself: are they prescribing – in which case how do they know, do they have a genie on staff – or are they working intelligently with you to understand value and develop solutions, both for your customers and within your organisation?