AI will replace middle management before robots replace hourly workers
What does chess have in common with retail middle management? As someone who has managed a retail store and played chess, I can confidently answer: nothing.Remember when Watson beat Ken Jennings at Jeopardy? And then IBM saturated the airwaves with ads about how Watson was going to revolutionize industries like energy and health care? Notice how we don’t see those ads anymore? It’s because winning Jeopardy has nothing to do with providing health care and energy. Like chess, it’s an artificially constrained game with a clearly defined goal. Whereas business is unconstrained and nobody knows what will succeed over time.The hardest thing about management is managing people, who are generally self-centered, opinionated, and wishing they were doing something else. How, specifically, will AI be better at that than humans? AI cannot even reliably autocorrect this comment as I’m typing it. How is it going to convince Jack to switch his shift and come in to cover open on Sunday because Jill’s sister was in a car accident and Jill is watching her niece? How’s AI going to do that better than a fellow human?