Insights The best version of yourself and AI

The best version of yourself and AI

The AI revolution is here and it has the opportunity to change every position in our businesses by altering the type of work that people perform and the type of thinking we conduct. This week Intuit announced layoffs of 1,800 employees, only to target hiring back 1,800 new employees in new roles and new capabilities. This is interesting coming on the coat tails of the same company building AI into the very product that consumers used to do their taxes this year. Is their strategy the best one to make the transition? It may be, it may not be, but the key thing to take with you from this and other related news is that optimization of our jobs is very possible and necessary leveraging AI. The change is not just limited to the optimization of jobs however, the big transformation is whether we can successfully leverage AI to enable every person to be the best version of themselves. This is a moment where we can help all people to make the transition to leveraging AI for personal productivity tasks, for imagination, for creation, and for the execution of the very nature of the business.

I was working with a major software vendor is recent weeks and the development team has begun to adopt GitHub Copilot. The meeting with the executive team was stunning in the news shared surrounding the results from Copilot. The anecdotal evidence, as well as the objective evidence shows that the developers with an AI assistant are much more productive than the ones without. In one example a developer saved a day of development time and research (not to mention having to ask his co-workers) in order to build a new module. The clear result was that the developers were faster at turning idea into action by leveraging AI tools.

I was working with a company that is building an onboarding process using Copilot Studio, a process that they run many tens of thousands of times per year. The automation possible with Copilot Studio enables the organization to create drastically faster onboarding, management, and offboarding of employees in a very transactional business. The outcome is to allow the HR team members to focus energy on high value interactions with the team members instead of just repeatable onboarding activities.

I was working with a service provider that needed to scale their organization without requiring an increase in the repeatable roles. They also wanted to optimize patient visits and provide the best experience for the caretakers and patients. In their scenario AI enables the automation of routine tasks to allow the caretaker to focus more energy on the patient rather than on the data capture, billing, or note entry.

What is common across all these examples? AI is enabling people to not just “accomplish more with less”, but to focus their energies on high value activities and delegate activities to AI agents. In some cases these required very little build, in other cases it was completely custom to the organization. In all of the cases the engineer, human resources, or care taker could focus energy on the most important parts of their job, rather than the supporting details.

Why is all of this important? Ask yourself… why did I get into this job? I doubt an HR professional got into the job because they wanted to be constantly texting people during the onboarding process that they forgot a step. I doubt the caretakers were really interested in filling out that next form. I’m sure the developers wanted to create outcomes, not just google how to write a certain line of code. They are all called to a higher purpose and higher outcomes than simply clicking buttons and performing repetitive tasks.

So, how does this all enable a person to be the best version of themselves? Well… AI alone won’t do that, but it’s a tool to get there. The most important parts of being the best version of yourself is attitude, your inspiration, your work ethic, and your ability to learn. The AI part is a supporting character that requires those skills. We have a time where we can explore how every person can create opportunities to be more with AI and the time for both company and personal investment in that transformation is now.

What does this mean? Is everyone becoming a data scientist? No, but every person should focus on acquiring AI skills, either to use AI, apply AI to business processes, or look at business opportunities through the lens of AI as a scale mechanism. Think of your existing business strategy and imagine what is possible with technology as a force multiplier to make this possible. To do this you likely are learning a new set of exploratory, visioning, growth mindset, and tech-awareness skills. The process of thinking differently and imagining a possible future is key to becoming who you can be.

I’ll be clear on this next point… it is the responsibility of every business and every professional to focus on this transition. It is not singularly the responsibility of either. Each has the responsibility to enact this 100%, with each complementing the other. If your business isn’t making the transition… make the transition yourself and find one that is. If your people aren’t making the transition… ask yourself why? Is the business helping them develop the new skills necessary to see success? Now is the time to make the investment not just in technical skills, but in delegation, creativity, mindset, and foundational skills.

Is it too big to think that AI can help every person become the best version of themselves? Some might think so and some might say there is a lot of hype here. I on the other hand believe it is part of our opportunity to thrive as people, but only if combined with the foundational skills development necessary to combine technology with the right essential human capabilities that make us special in the first place.

Thank you for reading.

Nathan Lasnoski