The hottest job in 2024 is undoubtedly Chief AI Officer (CAIO). From technology companies to healthcare providers to universities, organizations are hiring CAIOs in droves. In March, the White House spurred a wave of government hiring by announcing that federal agencies must appoint Chief AI Officers “to ensure accountability, leadership, and oversight” of the technology.
Given the rapid rise of AI, this trend is not surprising. Indeed, it reflects a widespread instinct and reaction across organizations of all kinds, despite the potential limitations that AI can have on efficiency and competitiveness.
When faced with a promising emerging field like AI, many organizations simply create new senior roles and then return to business as usual. This Band-Aid solution is often a corporate guise that signals that the company is playing catch-up with the latest developments without any real evolution, integration, or lasting business impact.
I call this response and approach “Drugstore Cowboy” – all hats and no cows. Like the guy who bought his Stetson hat at CVS but has never been to a rodeo.
In this climate, companies that approve the hiring of a CAIO on a “hat only, no cow” basis are making a move that is unlikely to go well.
Consider, for example, how the business world responded when Amazon exploded from a bookstore to a one-stop shop for everything: In response to the company’s famous “obsession with the customer,” more and more companies began appointing Chief Customer Officers to be responsible for CX, or customer experience.
Overall, this movement has not been successful, primarily because many CCOs are merely titular – they have no real authority or influence and are unable to truly put the customer first. Additionally, their role often limits or minimizes the CX responsibilities of other leaders.
This thinking isn't just theoretical: Research shows that companies whose CEOs own CX are more likely to be profitable.
What's more, every Amazon team member carries a heavy responsibility for customer experience: from C-level executives to delivery drivers, excelling in CX is part of the job.
CEOs, did you get the message? As a chief executive officer, you need to take responsibility for your company's AI plan and strategy. From there, make the development and implementation of your AI vision key to every leader's job, and drive to consider high-impact, high-potential scenarios and opportunities. These are big bets and require thoughtful, proven strategies. For example:
- Don't rush into hiring a CAIO. Instead, consider soliciting AI expertise to inform multidisciplinary teams of empowered stakeholders. These units should be tasked with exploring and operationalizing how AI can help improve current business operations and create the conditions to rapidly decide how the business will operate in the future.
- Foster AI partnerships, not gatekeepers. The team responsible for AI research should reflect the people who control the pace of the effort. By bringing together a variety of experts and instilling a mindset that the success of AI for the organization is their primary objective, they will collaborate and share ownership and responsibility, rather than getting in each other's way.
- Establish an alternative digital universe. A separate environment that mirrors the key data, schema, and rules of your legacy systems allows your teams to rapidly prototype, experiment, test, and review new AI integrations and solutions while maintaining stability in your organization's day-to-day operations.
This effort starts with overcoming the misconception that AI expertise is a critical skill for making an impact, when in fact expertise must extend to imagination, innovation, storytelling, and building broad partnerships to drive change and build AI-specific capabilities.
Companies that take this path will be the first to realize the transformative potential of AI and become the standard-bearers for the next generation, setting an example for others to follow.
