AI-smart, not AI-first

Many companies are rushing into “AI-first” mandates right now. We’ve seen this pattern before. A decade ago, it was “cloud-first,” and it led to the same outcome: Fast adoption, thin governance and a wave of security and cost problems that took years to unwind. By 2019, OMB had to formally pivot federal policy from cloud-first…

AI agents should retrieve facts, not define them

I have made this mistake before. The goal was to create an executive intelligence agent: an artificial intelligence (AI) engine where C-suite executives could self-serve their analytics and pull trusted numbers for the board. The promise was strong: personalized dashboards, ad hoc analyses, automated tasks and board decks, all from a single interface. Much faster…

The 7 new Cs of IT leadership for the AI era

AI is accelerating the pace of change, shortening the shelf life of expertise, reshaping operating models, and compressing the time IT leaders have to learn, decide, and act. As a result, IT leaders are increasingly forced to make consequential decisions faster, often with less information, greater ambiguity, and higher stakes. Formore than four decades, I’ve…

Digital transformation fails without this culture shift

In companies where digital transformation (DX) isn’t progressing as expected, the common barrier is not technology but the organization. You’ve introduced AI tools. You’ve organized your data. You’ve developed DX talent. Why aren’t you seeing results? Could the reason be that the organizational culture hasn’t been established where people feel safe to take on challenges…