Right now, AI narratives seem to be propagating an ROI of return on ignorance instead of a more productive ROI, “return on intelligence.” Enterprise leaders are currently navigating a critical transition toward AI-native operating models, yet AI adoption is stalling due to a fundamentally flawed narrative. Instead of focusing on strategic growth, the leadership conversation is paralyzed by speculative doomsday prophecies, a paralyzing fear of change, and a narrow focus on task automation for cost-cutting. This alarmist approach to the…
AI Is Changing More Than Work, It’s Rewiring Executive Decision-Making
The most important AI shift in business right now is not happening in the tech stack. It’s happening in the mindset of leadership. As executives lean more heavily on AI to guide decisions, a bigger question is coming into focus: is AI expanding judgment, or slowly replacing it? A March 2026 report highlighted by The Register, citing Confluent’s survey of 200 UK private-sector leaders, found that 62% of leaders use AI to make the majority of their decisions. Not some…
What it means when CEOs Step Down Because the Future of AI Arrived Faster Than the Role
When major CEOs begin framing succession around AI, it signals something larger than a changing of the guard. It suggests that the leadership model itself is being redefined in real time. This is not about becoming more efficient with new tools. It is about whether today’s leaders can redesign work, decision-making, and value creation for a world shaped by intelligence at scale. Recently, two iconic CEOs announced that they’re stepping aside and called for a new genre of leader in…
AI Business Reinvention Starts Where Legacy Thinking Ends
I recently sat down with Geoff Nielson on Digital Disruption, produced by Info-Tech Research Group, for a conversation that went far beyond the usual AI headlines. We talked about what AI is actually changing inside the enterprise, why so many organizations are mistaking activity for progress, and what leadership has to do with whether AI becomes a force for optimization or reinvention. Please do watch the conversation (video embedded below). It’s fun and rich with insights from the frontline of…
AI Is Reshaping Business, Yet Most Leaders Are Investing in the Optimization of Yesterday
If AI is eating the world, you could also say that it’s also exposing leadership. The companies that win next will not be the ones that automate the fastest, but the ones that learn to imagine bigger. That’s how we’ll start this story. Also, my keynote is below if you’d like to jump straight to the video. At Integrated Systems Europe in Barcelona, I talked about AI in a way that made some people nod, some people uncomfortable, and others…
AI Is Eating the World, Are We Ready to Dream Bigger?
At Integrated Systems Europe, I had the opportunity to continue the conversation after my keynote, “AI is Eating the World,” in a candid video interview with Rise TV about where artificial intelligence is really taking us, and where we’re still thinking far too small. AI is often compared to the discovery of fire, the invention of the wheel, or even electricity. Those comparisons are dramatic, but they’re not entirely wrong. These weren’t just inventions. They were enabling forces. They expanded…
Most Companies Are Using AI to Cut Costs, Smart CHROs Will Use It to Rebuild Work
Everyone is talking about AI as if the future of work is just a headcount story. It is not. That framing is too small, too reactive, and too dangerous. The real shift is not that AI will simply replace jobs. It is that AI is forcing companies to rethink what work is, how value gets created, and where human contribution becomes even more important. That changes the mandate for CHROs completely. CHROs cannot stay in a reactive HR role. They…
SXSW 2026: cognitive darwAInism, AI Slop, the Hidden AI Tax, and a Futurist Coming Home
This is a thoughtful piece by Danny Devriendt. Thank you, my friend. 🙏 Brian Solis is far from a neutral observer in my SXSW story; he’s a friend I’ve known for a long time, and one of the people who helped me -and a whole generation- see the social web for what it really was back in the day. Long before social media became a relentless ad machine, he wrote The Social Media Manifesto, arguing that this wasn’t a new…
The Companies That Win With AI Won’t Just Cut Costs, They’ll Redesign Work
Based on interviews in May 2025 and subsequent, more detailed,, and repeated warnings in 2026, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has predicted that artificial intelligence could wipe out roughly 50% of all entry-level white-collar jobs within the next one to five years. Amodei is sounding the alarm to get our attention. If he’s right, leaders don’t get the luxury of debating whether disruption is coming, they’ll have to manage how it lands. Amodei’s advice is to track track where AI is…
CTRL-ALT-DEL: Rebooting Your Business in the AI RenAIssance
Florence has a way of putting ambition in perspective. You’re surrounded by reminders that the future is something people choose to design, even when the tools, materials, and models of the day feel limiting. That’s what I kept thinking about as I prepared for the Baker Hughes Annual Meeting conference in January 2026. I’m proud to share that they 10-minute keynote address is now online and I’ve included it below 👇 This is not Just a Future of Work Moment,…