@tjrobertson52

You wouldn't hire a senior level employee and then hand them a broom. Right, but that's exactly how we're treating AI right now.

I think businesses are just starting to realize there's a huge gap between what AI models are now capable of and how we're actually using them. The reason for that gap is that we haven't figured out how to work AI into our processes the right way.

Most businesses are just looking at their current processes and trying to figure out which individual steps could be handled by AI. And when you look at it that way, the answer is typically not a whole lot. Most of the important steps in your existing processes require some degree of judgment or context or trust that these models just don't have yet.

And so we end up giving them only the most basic tasks where there's little to no risk of them making a mistake. Things like writing the first draft of a document that a human then still has to review, or brainstorming a list of ideas that a human can then select from.

If you're paying attention to how quickly these models are improving and how much the smartest people are already able to do with them, it's easy to see that they have way more potential. The problem isn't that the AI models can't handle our processes. It's that our processes were built for humans.

I think we've reached the point where it makes sense to rebuild our processes around the AI's capability. Abilities. And we should be thinking not just of how capable the models are today, but how capable they're likely to be in the next year or two.

We need to start thinking of AI as one of the most talented members of our team, but also talented in a thousand different ways with the ability to be multiplied a thousand times. If you were to hire an exceptionally talented person to your team right now, you'd be foolish to just give them your existing processes and say, hey, follow this checklist. No, you would start from first principles.

You'd start with the goal in mind and you determine a process that works with the talents of this person.

So I would challenge you to pick one process in your organisation. Not an individual task, an entire process. Scrap the existing checklist and think through what would it look like if AI handled this from start to finish.

We've been doing this at my digital marketing agency for the past six months or so, and I can tell you it's difficult. When you first start things with the process, you're gonna say, no, I need a human for that. I need a new human for that.

I really can't hand it over to AI.

But if you really force yourself to think, what if I had to hand this over to AI? Gun to my head, why do I feel like the AI isn't capable of this specific step? Maybe the AI doesn't have the appropriate context or memory.

Well, a system that handles that context can already be built, and I don't think we're more than a few months away from this being a standard feature in all the top AI models.

Maybe a particular step just requires expert level judgement. Well, have you tried having the expert on your team that typically handles this judgement call write out his or her entire decision framework? It's not an easy thing to do.

Well, it might take you half a day to write out the framework for a single decision, but you only have to do it once.

Maybe a specific step requires a human to go into a specific piece of software or multiple pieces of software. Well, AI can already use most popular software, and I think it's safe to say that within a few years, if your software can't be used by AI, it will be obsolete.

Now, I'm not saying you can replace all the humans in your company. I think as you go through this process, you're gonna find the places where you still do need humans, and I think you should double down on those areas. And if the humans are freed up from all these other tasks, they can get really good in those areas.

I'm confident that over the next one to two years, we're going to see a huge delta between the companies that just keep replacing individual tasks with AI and those that redesign their processes from first principles with AI in mind.