By Studio D Founder, Jan Chipchase.
Like many of you I’ve been reflecting on the impact of AI and related computational processes on how we gather, manage, and act upon data to make sense of the world. Whilst evolutionary changes in how we work are constant, these new technological changes have triggered a paradigm shift that is upending jobs and industries, also affecting many members of the Studio D community.
For my next book on organisational sensemaking I’ve been obsessed with the question: “What knowledge, wisdom, processes and skills are required to elegantly navigate the age of AI and enhanced computational processing?”
At a high level successful, perhaps even elegant navigation requires three elements:
- a deep understanding of the fundamentals of what came before in a given domain,
- acknowledging why current practices and processes evolved into their current state, and,
- a set of principles for a given domain to guide decision making for the new reality.
With the first element it is always challenging to know what wisdom still holds true, but that simply ignoring past lessons learned is fundamentally flawed. It's better to understand something and discount it than flailing around in the dark. Similarly, principles provide a lens through which to assess new contexts so that they can be systematically adopted, prudently adapted or judiciously ignored. A set of principles also nudge us towards mindful adoption, prior to new ways of thinking and working becoming calcified.
There are many complimentary activities that can accelerate our understanding of a paradigm shift, for example running experiments using emergent technologies, and scenario planning, but in most situations these benefit from the three elements being in place.
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Photo: Unscripted moment, Köln.