How AI Is Changing Communication: Weighing Efficiency with Efficacy
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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I'm Alison Beard.
And I'm Adi Ignatius, and this is the HBR IdeaCast.
For the next few weeks, we'll be dropping an episode each Thursday that explores how the rapid advancement of AI is changing what it means to be an executive.
How is generative AI changing the way executives communicate?
Today, Adi, we're going to look at one of the core ways that generative AI is adding value, or maybe not, in organizations, and that's communication. A lot of people are using these tools to craft everything from emails to speeches, internal reports to client pitches. Do you see that as a good thing?
You know, as someone who writes for a living, I'm definitely not comfortable with having AI write for me. That said, I'm happy getting research assistance from generative AI. And I've seen it provide enormous writing and organizational help to people who are not writers by nature.
Yeah, I agree on your personal view. I see the upsides. I also see a lot of risks, even for non-professional writers, notably that people become too reliant on it so that they're not actually engaging with the work as much as they should, or sounding like humans or even making sense, even though the words might seem polished.
I think as with every other part of the organization, we will have to figure out with writing and communication, What is the proper balance between how much AI can and should do and what are the truly unique strengths that humans provide in the process? I mean, AI will give everyone a baseline writing and thinking ability. So that leaves it to humans to provide the missing ingredients that maybe ultimately make a difference, like judgment, like taste, curiosity, creativity, persuasion, prioritization, all of that.
Exactly. So today we are going to explore the ways that AI is changing writing, leading, and communication, especially for leaders, when they should use it, when they shouldn't, and the most important skills to develop right now. Our two experts are Matt Abraham, Stanford professor, author of Think Fast, Talk Smarter, and host of the podcast Think Fast, Talk Smart. and Wade Foster, the CEO of Zapier, which is a platform that connects multiple web applications so they can work together automatically with the help of AI. You can imagine he is a big user of generative AI. Here's our conversation. Wade, Matt, thanks so much for being on the show.
Yeah, thanks for having us. Really excited to be with you.
How can AI help leaders synthesize company information while protecting authenticity?
So Matt, let's start with you. How do you see AI changing the way we all, and especially leaders, communicate at work?
So AI is both helping and I believe hindering the way leaders are doing their work. It is absolutely providing an opportunity for leaders to synthesize a tremendous amount of information, to structure it in a way that's meaningful, to look for themes and trends that might have taken a long, long time to uncover. But at the same time, it poses the risk of jeopardizing authenticity, hindering empathy. So we have to be careful with how we absolutely deploy AI to help us as leaders and as individuals and organizations.
Wade, as the leader of an AI-focused company, I assume that you're a pretty heavy personal user of it. How has it changed the way that you talk to your team and your workforce?
You know, I think similar to Matt, there's a lot of advantages and definitely some tricky things that we sort of have to figure out in terms of etiquette. The massive benefit is I am able to ingest a lot more of what's going on inside the company. I can point an agent at all the data sources inside of a company, whether it's, you know, our Slack instance, email, meeting notes. project management, CRM tools, code base, et cetera. And so, you know, I can get summaries of, you know, most anything that's going on inside of a company at any given time.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:02–1:07
2
How is generative AI changing the way executives communicate?
1:07–3:12
3
How can AI help leaders synthesize company information while protecting authenticity?
3:12–6:10
4
How should executives use AI to brainstorm, structure, and review communications?
6:10–8:50
5
What AI communication rules should leaders set for transparency and accountability?
8:50–11:08
6
How can leaders avoid outsourcing empathy and critical thinking in high-stakes conversations?
11:08–15:27
7
How can leaders preserve their authentic voice when using AI to write?
15:27–21:38
8
How can leaders use AI to rehearse difficult conversations and prepare for meetings?
21:38–35:32
Speakers
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