Courageous AI Leadership In a New York Times interview, Brené Brown describes the current state of leadership in the face
AI is reshaping how students think and learn. The one course every university should teach? Training in cognitive sovereignty—how to collaborate with AI without losing what makes thinking human.
A conversation with Adam Cutler, Distinguished Designer, IBM.
In a New York Times interview, Brené Brown describes the current state of leadership in the face of AI as “a complete [expletive] show”:
“What it looks like is scarcity. We’re not doing enough, we don’t know enough, we don’t have enough people trained, we’re not investing enough. This is what everyone’s doing and we’re behind. So it looks like fear and scarcity driving huge investments in AI that aren’t even aligned with business strategy.”
I couldn’t agree more.
The launch of ChatGPT ignited a race—AI vendors, customers, and users all scrambling to get ahead without pausing to think. The result? Little progress in UX, cultural fracture as employees struggle with people-blind implementations, and leaders chasing the unimaginative goal of cutting headcount to boost the bottom line.
As Brené says, “A good leader to me right now is a leader who understands urgency but is working from productive urgency. Not, like my grandma would say, “chicken with your head off” urgency—we’re seeing a lot of that—but productive, strategic urgency. Again, agree! Headless chicken urgency leaves leaders running scared, convinced AI is turning everything upside down. Afraid of being left behind, they stop thinking and just grab at whatever’s in reach.
I believe that’s what’s leading everyone to think of AI solely as a cost reduction technology. AI companies are being wildly unimaginative by designing AI to replace humans. And their pitch is simple: buy our tech, reduce headcount, improve earnings—your investors will love you. With Wall Street’s shrinking time horizon, it’s no wonder CEOs compete to show cost savings as proof they won’t fall prey to AI. While they might get a brief respite from investor pressure, this fear-based response will contribute little to long-term value.
We’re looking for the courageous leaders who can hold off the near-term craziness and look to the future. Those who take the time to understand the long-term potential of AI and the application to their businesses. Those who seek to find opportunities for growth through new products, services, and markets. Those who want to shift employees to those new opportunities rather than shifting them out of the company altogether.
I’m reminded of the late 90s: short-term leaders put brochureware online and called themselves internet companies. Long-term leaders built entirely new ways of moving information and products around the world. The same choice faces us now.
That’s why we convene the Artificiality Summit: to imagine beyond fear and short-termism. Courageous leaders don’t just react; they create.
Join us in Bend, October 23–25, to design the future we actually want to live in.
Buy your ticket here.
As the academic year begins, questions about AI’s impact on learning are top of mind. Social media might suggest the solution is simple—ban AI or embrace it fully—but it’s not that straightforward. Students know their future involves AI, and they want to learn both about it and with it. But we’re only beginning to understand what it means to learn with AI—and what it means to not learn with AI.
In this essay, Helen shares how our research on human adaptation to AI applies to education—specifically, the one course we believe every university should be teaching. Building a healthy relationship with AI across different contexts is essential to meaningful learning. We frame this through a persona cube that incorporates three dimensions of adaptation: symbolic plasticity, cognitive permeability, and identity coupling.
Read on to see how we think universities can prepare students to truly “think in the age of AI.”
Note: yes, we’ve developed this course, and we’re exploring how best to bring it to life—at a single institution or across many. If you’re interested in partnering with us or supporting this effort philanthropically, we’d love to hear from you.
Adam has been a friend, advisor, and inspiration for several years. We first met when sharing the stage at a Starbucks Innovation Expo event. So it's only fitting that Adam joined us on stage at last year's Summit and will join us again at this year's Summit.
In this conversation, we talk about how generative AI is reshaping creativity, reliance, and human experience. As always, a conversation with Adam offers a thoughtful, caring view of possible futures with AI—and it’s heartening to hear from someone so central to the field who consistently puts humans first.
