How are CPOs feeling?

There was a real mixed bag of emotions around this topic. “Kite in a hurricane” made us laugh. The analogy in the room was that for some, this is their “COVID” moment. An opportunity to deliver truly career defining work, and further demonstrate the impact the people function has on our organisations.

AI Strategy Workshop

If you ask a senior people leader what the mission/vision for their company is, what the values that it’s people live by are, you’d expect them to rattle them off with ease.

This part of the people strategy has been intentionally curated and embedded in the early stages of a companies journey. The CPO it’s accountable guardian.

When it comes to leveraging AI, the CPO is becoming increasingly accountable, however the script has yet to be written.

Only 11% of senior leaders we surveyed had a clearly articulated AI strategy, that included People and Talent. 25% had nothing and nearly 50% were still at drafting stage.

Given the stakes, we’d better not f*ck it up.

A vision

We looked briefly at a few examples of vision statements. It is tricky to find clearly articulated AI strategy aimed at internal audiences out in the open. But these examples offer a window into what they might look like.

We then asked leaders to discuss what theirs looked like and where comfortable stress test the thinking they already had amongst their peers.

Shopify — “Reflexive AI usage is now a baseline expectation.”

The CEO, Tobi Lutke shared an internal memo, that had been leaked on social media via this Twitter post. This is an example of a crystal clear expectation for how AI should be used and included reflections on how the company had approached AI adoption to date. “The call to tinker with it was the right one, but it was too much of a suggestion.”

Renault Group – “Tools evolve quickly. Culture takes time.”

This was part of their responsible AI charter. 46k employees have been trained at Renault. They have also created an internal secure platform for everyone to use. This is a clear enabling infrastructure. This emotive statement is almost certainly something an employee heard on an internal all hands type call.

“My dream is that anyone at Renault Group – whether they work in a factory, an office, or in the field – feels empowered to identify risks, ask the right questions, and shape better AI choices.”

A signal of a very inclusive vision for adoption of AI.

While both are ultimately angling at the same thing. They way they approach it stays true to the core values and culture within the organisation.

A vision without a plan is just a pipe dream

Ben @Bond Global shared one concrete example of what a high level, directional plan could look like. To underpin a clear vision. In this example he shared how he directionally steered our Talent Partners to think about the future end to end talent processes we would build side by side with our partners. Asking them to “challenge it” and “prove it” in practice.