Machine and the manager - changing leadership equation

CEOs are maturing to become ‘chief experimentation officers’, argues a report by McKinsey and Co:

Can there be a decision-making algorithm? Or as a step ahead, can such a decision-making algorithm assume the position of a board member in a corporate?

Yes, according to a new report by McKinsey and Co. It says Deep Knowledge Ventures, a Hong Kong VC firm, has ‘appointed’ such a decision-making algorithm on its board of directors.

Citing this as an instance of how leadership equations are changing with technology inching ahead to take over critical functions, the authors of the report, Martin Dewhurst and Paul Willmott, who are directors in McKinsey’s London office, argue: “...the advances of brilliant machines will astound us, but they will transform the lives of senior executives only if managerial advances enable them to. There’s still a great deal of work to be done to create data sets worthy of the most intelligent machines and their burgeoning decision-making potential. On top of that, there’s a need for senior leaders to ‘let go’ in ways that run counter to a century of organizational development.”

HUMAN TOUCH CRUCIAL

The two are, however, confident that if these two things happen - and they are sure they’re likely to - the role of the senior leader will evolve. “We’d suggest that, ironically enough, executives in the era of brilliant machines will be able to make the biggest difference through the human touch. By this we mean the questions they frame, their vigor in attacking exceptional circumstances highlighted by increasingly intelligent algorithms, and their ability to do things machines can’t. That includes tolerating ambiguity and focusing on the ‘softer’ side of management to engage the organization and build its capacity for self-renewal,” they say.