Prof K S Chandrasekar
kscnair@gmail.com
India recently held the AI Impact Summit, New Delhi. The message is clear and loud. AI is here to the eternity. How mankind will face the same, adapt and adopt to themselves is a big question mark. Matt Schumer mentioned that in 2022, AI couldn’t do basic arithmetic reliably. By 2023, it could pass the BAR exam. By 2024, it could write working software and explain graduate-level science. By late 2025, some of the best engineers in the world said they had handed over most of their coding work to AI. Dario Amodei, Anthropic CEO has predicted that AI will eliminate 50 percent of entry-level white-collar jobs within one to five years. Matt further mentioned that AI can already read contracts, summarize case law, draft briefs, and do legal research at a level that rivals junior associates. Building financial models, analyzing data, writing investment memos, generating reports. AI handles these competently and is improving fast. A year ago, AI could barely write a few lines of code without errors. Now it writes hundreds of thousands of lines that work correctly. This will have far reaching consequences like far fewer programming roles in a few years than there are today. In medical area, reading scans, analyzing lab results, suggesting diagnoses, reviewing literature. AI is approaching or exceeding human performance in several areas. AI is becoming excellent in customer service as genuinely capable AI agents.
Harvard Business Review says that leaders must decide where to automate, where to augment human judgment, where to keep control fully human, and how to deal with the ability that Gen AI often grants them to do more with fewer people. First it was AI, then generative AI and AI assistants. Now its agentic AI and artificial general intelligence (AGI) that can, in theory, mimic the cognitive capacity of the human brain. This change freed thousands of hours for client engagement just as the function, sales and marketing, was shifting towards greater reliance on automated forecasting and predictive analytics. Leaders must provide clarity, trust, and training so employees feel prepared rather than replaced. Human wisdom and acumen are essential for making the most of AI. A clear plan, ethical policies, and role-based training ensure AI empowers rather than overwhelms. Leaders set the tone for embracing disruption. By modeling curiosity, responsible use, and forward-thinking strategies, they help teams turn AI into a tool for growth, innovation, and resilience. A study showed that PepsiCo merged the responsibilities of strategy, transformation and technology, allowing its chief strategy and transformation officer, Athina Kanioura, to leverage AI by redesigning the organization-and making it doubly important for the organization’s executives to work with her to identify process inefficiencies and opportunities arising from new capabilities.
Amul, the world’s largest cooperative of milk farmers, with 36 lakh members recently launched an AI-based advisory service called ‘Sarlaben’. Using a feature phone and speaking in Gujarati, farmers could speak to the AI assistant ‘Sarlaben’ and get guidance on cow health, feeding and ways to improve milk yield. In the age of AI, reskilling and up skilling are top priorities, but people development is more than building skills. It’s also about nurturing confidence, growth, and a sense of belonging. And that’s something only humans can offer. While AI might identify skill gaps, it can’t replace the contributions that fuel personal and professional growth. According to research, 42 percent of turnover of people is preventable and replacing an employee can cost up to twice their salary.
In the leadership styles, there are four quadrants. Directing, coaching, delegating and supporting. The style needs to be followed in that pattern as mostly people will not be aware of AI and often fear that their roles will vanish. This is where Jack Welch of GM stands out. Welch’s philosophy and charge to his followers to make GE the number one company in every market that the company operated in, was an example of an inspirational motivation. His ”workout” program that charged employees to solve problems, the implementation of the six-sigma program and the removal of a nine-layer management hierarchy are some examples of how Welch stimulated his managers intellectually. He demonstrated individualized consideration through his habit of writing personal notes to compliment and support employees on special occasions. He constantly pushed his managers to perform, and he also regularly rewarded the top 20 pecent with bonuses and stock options. Leaders need to learn from him on how to implement AI in the years to come by slowly removing the fear factor in them. AI can be first introduced at the customer level where the employees do not have much access and later on it can be brought into the operational side and in forecasting.
The leaders who end up thriving in the AI era will be those who blend human depth with digital fluency. They will use AI to think with them and will not be dependent on them. They will treat this AI moment not as a threat to their leadership but as an opportunity to focus on those elements of their portfolios that only humans can excel at and focus more time on that. Organizations need to actively identify and develop the individuals who demonstrate critical skills like resilience, eagerness to learn from mistakes, and the ability to work in teams that will increasingly include both humans and AI agents. AI won’t replace managers, but managers who use AI will replace those who don’t. AI will not deliver value simply because firms spend money on AI tools and infrastructure. It will deliver value when leaders develop the new competencies needed to transform their firms and teams so that they can make full use of the technology’s potential to provide real strategic advantage. Washington Post has laid thousands of employees so by Google and Amazon etc., citing cost factors but the real reason is AI. This is going to affect the Content industry. There is a need for revitalization of this industry with AI being embedded. Engineering degree will be obsolete in another 13 years (as per Anthropic CEO in WEF). AI + Block Chain + Crypto will be the way ahead. Elon Musk is trying to integrate X with Crypto, and it is in beta testing. It will shake the world financial market. Anthropic developed a robot which has about to acquire consciousness as per the reports. All industries need to follow this to absorb AI into reckoning.
“The Leader of tomorrow must be AI-aware, not AI-dependent”
(The author is Vice Chancellor, Cluster University of Jammu, Jammu)
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