by Peter A. Arthur-Smith, Leadership Solutions, Inc.®

“For all his  love of algorithms and informatics, Dr Tetteh argues that technology (AI) can’t work without empathy for patients.” Wall Street Journal article by Allan Ripp entitled: ‘How AI Will Make Your Doctor Smarter’- November 2021

You can imagine the level of interest this article invoked within this writer. It also quoted Dr. Tetteh, a health mission advisor at the Pentagon, as saying: “Always listen to patients before running tests – they will tell you their diagnosis.” Such a quote reminds this writer of his thoughts every time he encounters psychics, where they size people up and listen intently to their initial utterances – based upon some well rehearsed questions – so they can amaze them with their psychic prognosis. How is it that a well practiced psychic hits the truth?…not through AI.

This WSJ article also reminded your writer of another expansive newspaper article that reported the many contract cancellations by pharmaceutical and research companies with IBM’s Watson, because it couldn’t provide them with the diagnoses and health predictions they were looking for. This underscores the unrealistic hype surrounding AI. Because it could win against a master chess player, notwithstanding it was programmed with every conceivable chess move over decades, they were hyped into thinking that it could diagnose countless health issues. That’s an easy sell bearing in mind man’s reluctance to think too hard. The contracts were worth $Ms.

So, for all the hype surrounding AI, we should be wary of getting ahead of ourselves. AI depends upon hours upon hours of input from all relevant data sources, which, even then, may not come close to the judgment of an expert mind with its 3 lb brain. One distinct advantage that IBM Watson does have when challenged by a chess master, is that it’s not affected by the enormous human pressures that are apparent on such a match-up; which could cause a grand-master to underperform as a human. The media doesn’t relate to such human frailties…except for the commentators when they get back to their off-the-screen life!

Consequently, it’s important for business and organization leaders to put things into perspective, as they relish the thought of computers and robots replacing their expensive and irksome humans. There are clearly functions and circumstances where these technology “marvels” can outperform humans when repetition and consistency are paramount… they can consistently do this 24/7. That relieves humans from what they would rather not be doing.

However, judging by other recent articles about Amazon and its robot and automation prowess, it still needs oodles of people to monitor and feed those robots with customer boxes. One article underscored its misuse of people to the point where unionization is a constant threat. The same piece concluded that Amazon would always need more people rather than less, because its efficiency models permitted dramatic expansion at reasonable costs providing more people were hired to keep the box lines moving. It’s biggest issue with its efficiency rather than people-mindedness, is staff burn-out. In fact many hires don’t even last two weeks. The company judges everyone by their “rate” and not how they “feel:” rather like those news journalists!

At the end of the day, it’s clear that so many senior executives are hell-bent on ridding themselves of people. Why? This writer suspects it’s because they and their manager teams really don’t know how to handle their people. Their own shortcomings as people – especially as many of them are introverted, financial nerds at heart – puts them at a disadvantage when leading humans. Rather than educating themselves to a higher leadership standard to draw out their people’s extraordinary gifts and capabilities to help build momentum, They would far rather hire a mindless computer or robot that doesn’t know how to do the same. They don’t have to talk to either machine every day! Sounds a bit like Scrooge doesn’t it?

On the one hand, this writer is encouraged that our experts are beginning to recognize the shortcomings of AI, while on the other he worries that blinkered technologists are still pipe-dreaming about their next round of wizardry to make working people disappear. At the same time, companies like Amazon unreasonably exploit their people, as in the darkest days of the industrial revolution, through the use of technology: even though they need them to build its momentum.

It is to be hoped that this writer’s book “People Count more than Numbers: Enlightened Leadership Re-Visited”, will see the light of day before it’s too late. That way executives will be challenged to step-up to the plate and make full use of their people’s talent and ability to grow: in turn they will reap extraordinary performance, rewards and venture momentum. Just look around at some of the outstanding sports teams, if you’re not convinced. They will learn to put AI into perspective and be more circumspect about their pipe-dreams and build through their people talents.

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Author, Peter A. Arthur-Smith, Founding Principal with Leadership Solutions, Inc., is based in New York, and author of Smart Decisions: Goodbye Problems, Hello Options. He has drafted a potential new publication, People Count more than Numbers: Enlightened Leadership Re-visited that offers a slew of fresh leadership concepts and practical models. Feel free to follow author at: Linkedin.com/in/peter-arthur-smith-2115722/

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