The 5 AI tension leaders must navigate

The introduction of AI in the workplace inevitably creates tension. For example, the same tools that ease the drudgery and make work easier can also eliminate the challenging frictions that give work meaning, build important skills, and increase satisfaction. What tensions most often arise in the workplace – and what effect do they actually have? Insights collected from over 100 executives show that they are grappling with multiple competing forces: experts vs. newbies, centralization vs. decentralization, steep vs. flat hierarchies, fast vs. slow, and top-down vs. bottom-up change. Smart leaders don’t mindlessly go to one extreme or the other. They remain curious. They view these and other tensions as design features and constraints. Not as bugs or annoying problems that they can and should be fixed, but as something that can be managed and exploited.