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Law At Work group managing director Simon Nash says leaders must know the difference between the artificial and the authentic
“IF anyone builds it, everyone dies.” That’s the shocking title of a forthcoming book by tech futurist Eliezer Yudkowsky.
His idea is that we are racing to create superhuman AI, a machine artificial intelligence that will be sufficiently smart to develop goals of its own.
Once the machines can create goals, they will come into conflict with human aspirations for the future. In the ensuing conflict, he prophesies that the machines would crush us.
And it wouldn’t even be close, he says.
On the other hand, just about every week I’m getting invited to seminars and briefings that warn of the dangers of being “left behind the change curve” and missing the promise of massive increases in “productivity” by the replacement of human effort with tech-generated digital content.
That means there is a leadership question at the heart of this. But then, to be honest, in my practice, I do tend to see everything as a question of ethical leadership.
As leaders, we are trying to paint a vision of the future and then equip our people to deliver services to customers that bring us a little closer to realising that better world. Leadership, then, is a very human art, and one which brings to the fore the leader’s own humanity as well as recognising the humanity of her clients and her comrades.
What are the options for leaders with respect to AI then?
Well, one approach is to “move fast and break things”. Early adoption and rapid innovative change. Flood the market with variant products, processes and ideas and see which ones survive.
This Darwinian approach to change is great where the risks of failure are small. But rapid innovation by trial and error is the worst way to innovate in fields where the price of failure is unacceptable. And the trouble is, most of our clients would urge us to consider their health, wealth or safety as being worthy of a more measured risk-based appraisal.
What about the idea of resisting the technological wave? People often use the term Luddite to refer to someone who has a dim-witted naivety about new technologies, or a phobia of the latest devices and gadgets.
The truth is, the original Luddites were far from this caricature. Luddism was an early-19th-century socially revolutionary movement for better work, in better conditions, for better pay.
Therefore, direct activism for a better world is one alternative to the frenzied adoption of the new technology at any cost. But perhaps leaders in Jersey need to reflect and learn from both of these extremes and find a third way.
From the activists, we can learn to critically analyse the deeper “why?” behind any new technology. From the early adopters, we can learn the fun and energy that can come from playing with new ideas.
The one option that is not open to leaders is passivity.
The moment for leaders to show the way is now. Great leaders create businesses where people do good work for people, and they are well rewarded for it.
In an age of artificial intelligence, we need leaders who know the difference between the
artificial or fake and the authentic.
Leadership is human, and Jersey needs it more now than perhaps ever before.
