The Three Es of AI

Efficiency, efficacy, and ethics must inform the use of powerful information technologies.

With the uptake of AI by management, the issue of trust is gaining prominence. McLuhan (1964) reasoned, fascinatingly, that messages are shaped by their media, how users fashion their tools, and how the tools thereafter fashion their users. If management-by-communication constitutes a major component of stakeholder management/engagement, then media must influence that process. What becomes of trust?

AI maybe driving paradigmatic revisions. As information loads become drastically reducible courtesy of AI, should stakeholders and the activities in which they hold stakes be considered flows rather than discrete, project-bound instances? Is the project-based, stop-start approach to stakeholder management outmoded? Is a living stakeholder management system that encompasses all management activities – steady-state, project-based, and ad hoc – now optimal? AI is enabling new efficiencies, but trust (the product of reliability and relevance) must be ensured if management by AI is to be effective.