Nexus of Familiar to Unfamiliar

"If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it's not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That's why it's your path." Joseph Campbell*

Our life journeys are not linear. They wend along the road responding to personal, professional, and environmental dynamics.   Our singular stories, epic to only ourselves, weren’t documented in ancient tablets or Gutenberg’s press.  Yet, we created and lived tales of adaptation and change, however mundane we mistakenly think they were.   We changed with times. And the times changed with us.   

In the construct of the firm, the company, or your own life, change management methods are plentiful, and standards are available for the asking.  Surprisingly, or maybe not so, AI strategy is causing “change” dilemmas – what is the next step? What is even the first step?! The worrisome cliche of “solutions in search of problems” is rising again, as it does regularly in periods of high-speed development, socio-viral trends, and “can’t live without it” sales pitches.  Shallow complaints of “not seeing AI’s returns” have bubbled over.  Responding to those concerns, solid institutions and wise consultants are now explaining the reasons why.   

AI is not a solution; it is a journey as well, delivering earned value prerequisites along the road.  Portfolio thinking, cultural and ethical outlooks, outcome assessments are now paradoxes.  Your value chain is no longer functional towers and departmental-specific processes, but a web of value chain returns, internal and external to the enterprise.  AI is doing much of the weaving, and we are creating new perspectives and explanations of what a vibrant and competitive firm is.  This new operating model is one of change.

Change demands cultural and operational adaptation.  And adaptation demands talent -- humans and machines. Change is survival, for firms and even for new individual dreams, some provoked by whispers inside the head, the impatient itch, like Jack Kerouac's seeking relief from the mundane and needing a new horizon. 

Adventures large and small can be managed; we are equipped for them when we can adapt with confidence, believing we can master the new.   Don’t you see that your story is one of change, and it's awe-inspiring?

Tropes of Mastery

"Wearing several hats" is an oversimplification of your journeys' diverse experiences and diverse verticals.  Job changes were often followed by reinvention of your behavior; every job is different, from slightly to grandiose. You walked unfamiliar pathways because you’re human, and a longing for change is in your blood.  We marveled at fictional protagonists and their courage, but you had it too, even though the scenarios were not as exotic or "out there."

Strangers in strange lands is a familiar trope.  Throughout the history of storytelling we read of heroic acts, protagonists adapting and overcoming by logic, resourcefulness, intelligence and pure will.  Think of Daedalus finding escape from his Labyrinth, Kirk and Spock piloting alien crafts with no experience in the craft's design. Gulliver travelled to new lands, rapidly assimilating new languages, and unfamiliar cultures.   Weren’t those ascensions bigger than yours?  No, not necessarily.

From ancient classicists to present day hard sci-fi, the tropes opened insights into the human condition, not to mention entertainment. They also shined lights on your own journey.   Perhaps you are not creating Icarus’ wings to fly (and don’t get too near the sun!) but you are unraveling problem sets and complex challenges every day, vanquishing obstacles and overcoming fear of uncertainty.

A few years ago, Andy Weir published Project Hail Mary, yet another variation of the trope, whereby the protagonist, a fellow named Grace, navigated the perspectives of a non-human life form, collaborating with a being he named Rocky.  Faced with cosmic molecular threats to their respective planets, they leveraged knowledge, borrowed from each other’s experiences, mutually educated themselves, and gained through each of their histories.  In a more proximate way, it’s similar to you in your daily collaboration.     

Grace was always improvising, reaching in his mind’s library, his experiential life, histories of previous successes and his foundational understanding of molecular science.   We modeled AI on this construct, learning through memory and prior wisdom. Rocky was also a conscious and cognizant lifeform with an ethos of empathy, but Grace nevertheless had to translate the lifeform’s behavior and actions. 

Empathy is your leadership strength, getting under another’s skin, understanding others’ motivations, dreams and fears.   This is oft talked about in the gargantuan corporation.   Less so in small businesses.  And practically never on board a spaceship shared by two cosmically different species.   While empathy is key to managing change, adaptation is sustaining good in an uncertain future, whether in big business or small.

Graphics Clouds to Golf Carts

A good friend of mine was knee-deep in technology and team leadership.  An executive, an athlete, and great listener, synthesizing tech-speak and board room chatter, he managed the complex dynamics of digital and AI integration.   Until his life imagined change.

With recent memories around his storied career, he soaked in the Gulf breezes and beach destinations.  He could have lain in the sun all day.  But instead, he left high-rise conference rooms for country club transport.   How does a former computer geek expand a golf cart franchise?   Well, I doubt success would be sauntering across the fairway with a prospect, “So, friend, whaddya think of this beauty?  0 – 25 in under 2 seconds!…”    I’ve the sense his digital transformation leadership will take a markedly more sophisticated approach.   If you want to compete in a populated market, even remain afloat, you need the same talent as building a Digital Center of Excellence.   

The agentic AI opportunities inside a franchise need someone who's managed a portfolio of activity. No doubt any vehicle dealer can juggle a few priorities and outsource a broken axle, but that again diminishes the versatility talent that a wise owner requires.  The innovative mindset is transferrable from software to sloping; expansion is the opportunity inside his AI toolbox.

When I think of his Digital Transformation genius, I'm thinking he's a perfect leader for his new calling. I think this is true for any adaptable and knowledgeable professional, transferring and immersing business responsibilities into new verticals. 

His value chain still aligns to the classical imperative – inbound logistics, operations, sales and marketing.   And there is personnel management, competitive analysis throughout the region, waiting to be mined.   If one thinks this Business Management 101 perspective is just common sense, I’d argue that for every stage in the chain, his technology history among myriad stakeholders, both supporting and antagonistic, is his great asset. He understands proactive change and adaptation.  

Doesn’t any change in career or service or value demand the same?   An understanding of the major dynamics of customer, ecosystem, supply chain, needs a cool head to manage every snafu that arises with a new sun.   And most importantly, immersion and dedication to the new verticals' knowledge is paramount. The "skill of transferability," infrequently noticed by many professionals is immensely valuable. It is the genie lamp granting you new success in unfamiliar terrains, no matter the calling.

This is the frontier ahead, the path ahead, for AI scientists, managers and practitioners.   From large firms to small enterprises, you will be diving into entirely new verticals, educating yourself into new environments, and assimilating the history of the new vertical, its new ecosystem and dynamics. You will see the interconnectedness of solutions and code, and the interdependency of agentic AI.

Closure -- Journeys Beget New Journeys

In Project Hail Mary, change was most prominently demonstrated in the person of Grace himself.  His empathy allowed him to understand a completely different "person."  His unfaltering focus on solving problems, his reflective nature and logical mind didn’t just subvert disaster and avert planetary catastrophe.  His experience working with another created a new outlook, and opened the door to even newer journeys. Grace would then face another whisper in his mind, and a different path, unlike anything he could have imagined.

Weir’s “hard sci-fi” novel is impressive.  But, in and of itself, Project Hail Mary has flaws that we cannot ignore as we advance AI.   His antagonist (Stratt) is practically a cardboard archetype, bordering on sociopathy, dismissive of Grace’s free will, and forcibly sticking him into a mission he refused, for utilitarian but unguaranteed outcomes.  Here is where the hero trope intersects our AI world, and these are the dilemmas we will face, with courage, whether in small business or large. This was a lost opportunity to dissect the antagonist's amorality.

As we continue to evolve AI, we may be facing questions of our own fate and the individual ability to choose. This demands we be ever deliberate and ever watchful.  Inside change management is the requirement of collaboration.  That is the safety net -- the thousand eyes of checks and balances.  And we will need them.

AI is changing with us, as we are changing with AI.  The technology’s behavior will mimic our own, for better or worse.  By design and by our own commitment to make change "for the good," the journey will be an eternal one of new paths and adaptations.   As AI learns from us, it’s incumbent on us to educate ourselves in new walks of life, in new technologies and in roots of philosophy. Every vertical and every path is connected to others.

This is the “nexus of familiar to unfamiliar,” the moment of facing the unknown, armed only with courage and confidence to learn, again and again. 

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*Quote from A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living (compiled posthumously from his lectures and notes by Diane K. Osbon) Harper Collins, 1991.