• Published January 30, 2025
  • 12 Minute Read

Navigating the Impact of AI in Leadership: A Social Process Continues

Leaders must navigate the challenges of AI integration while emphasizing human connection and collaboration. Learn strategies for blending AI innovations with effective leadership to drive organizational success.
Published January 30, 2025
Navigating the Impact of AI in Leadership: A Social Process Continues

Why Understanding AI is Crucial for Leadership in the 21st Century

Artificial intelligence (AI) can accelerate insights, improve processes, and often deliver results more quickly and accurately than any human. And yet, AI is useless without human input.

Consider generative AI, which is behind tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. These tools represent a profound collaboration between human expertise and computational power. They’re the product of extensive human involvement — from foundational research and vast datasets to complex training and iterative refinement. And, even when they reach users, their outputs depend heavily on the quality of our prompts. In many ways, working with AI is the ultimate partnership between human input and technological capability.

As it becomes increasingly integral to organizational success, teams and stakeholders expect modern leaders to have a basic understanding of AI. Public-facing advancements like ChatGPT have made gaining this knowledge more accessible than ever. By moving beyond mere understanding to actively leveraging AI, leaders can transform it from a powerful tool into a true catalyst for innovation and growth.

AI Augments Your Leadership Capabilities

Our research has shown that change is a challenge for individuals, for leaders, and for organizations. As AI is increasingly present in our lives, leaders must find ways to adapt.

But through all this change, one thing remains constant: leadership is foundational. In fact, strong leadership enables us to navigate these shifts, using new insights and tools as opportunities to reinforce and enhance our established strengths.

AI may change the context of our work as leaders, but it cannot change the essence of leadership. We believe leadership is a social process that enables individuals to work together to achieve results that they could never achieve working alone. Our definition, supported by decades of research and experience, emphasizes that leadership is inherently a human activity, driven by communication, empathy, and collaboration.

AI can supplement our capabilities by providing data-driven insights, automating repetitive tasks, and generating predictive analyses. But, crucially, AI augments rather than replaces the human side of leadership. Our capacity to inspire, empathize, and connect on a personal level remains a unique part of what makes leadership happen.

Bringing AI’s analytical strengths together with our Direction – Alignment – Commitment (DAC)™ framework creates new opportunities for growth and meaningful development. Leveraging the best of both, leaders can continue to evolve, learning how AI can enhance their leadership while staying true to what makes leadership impactful: the human advantage.

AI & Leadership: Defining Common Terms

Understanding a few key definitions can build a foundation for you to leverage the complexity of AI.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) A broad area of computer science exploring ways for computers to perform tasks associated with human intelligence, like problem-solving and learning.
Machine Learning A method within AI that uses algorithms and data to make predictions through a process called “training.”
Model The “brain” of AI, combining data, algorithms, and computational techniques to analyze patterns or make predictions.
Training The iterative process of running algorithms on data to improve the model’s accuracy.
Generative AI A type of AI that creates human-usable content, like text, images, or audio, based on its training data.
Large Language Model (LLM) and Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT) LLMs are AI models specifically trained to understand and generate natural language. GPTs are a type of LLM, used in tools like ChatGPT, that can generate human-like output.
Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) A method that combines information retrieval with LLMs, searching for relevant data before generating responses, reducing misinformation.
Fine-Tuning Additional training to make models more accurate for specific tasks or industries.
Hallucinations When an AI generates misinformation. Since LLMs don’t search for live information, they sometimes produce plausible but incorrect answers, especially on niche or current topics.

Back to the Future: Tracing AI’s Evolution

Embracing change is a continuous and challenging endeavor, and the shifts related to AI in leadership are no exception. While recent generative AI tools represent a significant new wave, AI itself isn’t entirely new; it’s been quietly reshaping our lives for decades. From early chatbots and factory automation to recommendation algorithms on streaming and shopping platforms, AI has long helped us work and interact more efficiently — even if we didn’t call it “AI” at the time.

With a more complete picture of AI’s evolution, we can see these advancements as part of a continuum of innovation. This broader perspective helps us welcome AI’s potential as a force for growth and opportunity, rather than an unfamiliar obstacle. But even as AI advancements are part of a continuous evolution, they require us to adapt as well.

Leading Through the Disruption of AI

When you think about word disruption, what comes to mind?

If your answer includes thoughts like “turmoil,” “stress,” or “risk,” you’re not alone. Because change is difficult, it’s easy to view disruption as a negative event.

But if you navigate it intentionally, it’s possible to take advantage of the changing environment to drive your organization forward. AI is here to stay, and it’s the responsibility of leaders to make its impact positive for their teams and organizations.

To successfully lead through disruption, you need to rethink your role, adopt new identities, and create new meanings. We can look at AI from the perspective of each of these 3 shifts.

1. Rethink your role.

As recommended in our white paper on disruption, you need to rethink your role, adopt new identities, and create new meanings. We can look at AI from the perspective of each of these 3 shifts.

To recognize the benefits of AI, you’ll need to embrace it by incorporating it into your day-to-day work and encourage those you lead to do the same.

Your role doesn’t have to become Chief AI Cheerleader, but consider how you might explore AI-driven efficiencies on your own to show others the value.

Are there repetitive tasks that could be simplified? Tedious bits of writing that could be kick-started with generative AI? What about large data sets that might contain insights AI could quickly identify?

Try a few tasks where AI can make an impact to shift how you and your team spend time. Remember, human collaboration is what makes AI powerful. Your strategic thinking and understanding of context are key to making the most out of these tools. And always review the output before sharing or using it professionally.

2. Adopt new identities.

Instead of staying within traditional leadership roles, such as “the visionary,” consider exploring other roles.

Being “a consumer” means taking the perspective of your customers or clients, which can help you develop new ideas. Or try acting as “a catalyst” to encourage iteration and drive innovation. You could even explore being “the mad scientist” of your team, experimenting in creative ways and taking calculated risks.

If you can shift your perspective of yourself, you may find it easier to embrace disruption as a positive force. For example, if you were a mad scientist, how would you look at popular AI tools?  You’d likely look at your industry or function and find examples of how others are using AI. Then, you’d experiment, reflect on your results, and share any successes.

Even if this isn’t a strategy you usually identify with, you can use a temporary shift to broaden your perspective and explore opportunities you normally wouldn’t.

3. Create new meanings.

Using AI for the sake of using AI won’t automatically lead to innovation. AI use should fit your goals and add meaning on various levels, but it’s essential to stay focused. Consider how AI brings personal benefits, such as greater efficiency in your work, and how it might help your team work together more effectively.

For example, you could use a generative AI tool to synthesize weekly meeting notes, saving you time and making it easier to remember key details. Imagine the effect if everyone on your team did the same. AI won’t solve larger cultural issues, but it can make these small improvements that add up to more efficient and aligned teams.

Making the adoption of AI a personal priority will allow you to continually lead others as the technology continues to change. Change may be hard, but finding meaning in a new way of working more efficiently can make the disruption more than worth it.

4 AI Pitfalls to Avoid

As with any transformative change, it’s likely you’ll make mistakes along the way. You may spend time learning a new AI application that ultimately doesn’t help your productivity. Or you might make a push for AI implementation within your organization and see low adoption.

Making mistakes and learning from them is an expected part of disruption. Here are 4 common pitfalls to avoid: 

1. Don’t expect AI to solve all your problems.

You wouldn’t use a hammer to paint a wall because you know hammers have a limited purpose. Because AI is a broad field that tries to address huge problems, it’s easy to think AI is a solution to everything. This leads to frustration and wasted resources when it turns out AI isn’t the right option.

To avoid this, focus on clearly defining the problem you’re trying to solve instead of jumping to a solution. Only leverage AI when it directly addresses that problem.

2. Don’t disregard the multiple entry points for bias.

When it comes to AI, it’s important to be aware of how easily bias can be included. There are 2 primary ways that bias is introduced when using AI tools: by users and by the people making these tools.

First, you may write a prompt to a chatbot, generate a data set, or create input for AI that unintentionally includes your own bias. The developers of some of the most popular AI tools take precautions to censor explicit bias and other harmful language. For example, ChatGPT will decline to answer if your prompt includes hate speech.

Because AI is only as smart as its human collaborators, even advanced models may miss subtle biases. If AI doesn’t detect bias, it can unintentionally reinforce it. This human problem is best addressed by examining your own biases and being intentional about how you interact with AI and what inputs you use.

The second issue — the development of AI models — is harder for an individual to address. The data used to train AI models has potential to impact all its outputs, regardless of what a user might input.

Consider an example where an AI tool is trained using historical weather data from Norway. Then, someone uses that tool to make predictions about future weather patterns in Thailand. Would you expect the data to be accurate? In this simple example, the AI tool is biased because its dataset was limited.

This risk is amplified when you consider the context of leadership. What if we try to use AI to review resumes and find the best candidate, but the AI was only trained on resumes of employees from the top US companies? What if you have AI help with performance plans but the AI has no training data related to neurodivergent employees? What if we use AI to identify high potential employees, but the AI was trained on data of successful, late career men?

Each of these “what ifs” makes it clear that AI trained with biased data can lead to biased outputs. This might be easy to avoid if you knew ahead of time, but when you’re leveraging ready-to-use AI tools, you usually don’t have full visibility into their training data.

This is an ongoing area of research within the AI community and there is no simple solution. As a leader, you must be intentional about the contexts in which you apply AI. Always keep a human in the loop to double-check AI outputs and make sure that human is aware of potential bias.

3. Don’t be careless with data privacy.

The strength of AI comes from its ability to “learn.” Many companies, especially those providing free products, collect user data and use it to improve their AI models. This is what makes AI so powerful, but it also poses a risk if you’re not aware of the data you’re using.

Although you should be careful with all data, take extra care when handling “personally identifiable data” or any sensitive intellectual property. Always review the policies of the tools you use to understand how your data is used.

4. Don’t use AI outputs without human review.

When we mentioned bias, we addressed the need to keep a human involved when using AI. The more sensitive the context, the more intricately a human must be involved. AI can output inaccurate information for many reasons. Whether it’s limited training data or misguided user input, there is room for error.

So, before you use AI output or share it, take the time to look over the work like you might for a junior employee. Be ready to revise, either on your own or with the help of AI again. The extra time is worth ensuring you have accurate, complete, unbiased material to whatever extent possible.

AI & Leadership: From Endless Tools to Purposeful Change

With countless AI tools and applications, an understanding of AI has quickly become essential for today’s leaders. Whether you choose to embrace AI now or cautiously observe its impact, it’s hard to deny that effective, responsible use of AI can boost both efficiency and innovation in your organization.

To begin framing your approach to AI and leadership, familiarize yourself with the key concepts of AI so that you can identify the tools and approaches that will best serve you and your team. Embrace the role of experimenter: explore AI tools, assess their value, and share those insights to foster growth within your team.

Leading through technological disruption isn’t just about using the latest tools — it’s about creating meaning around these tools and integrating them thoughtfully into your work. This approach requires agility, curiosity, and a commitment to continuous learning. In a world where technology changes constantly, leaders who adapt and learn with agility will have an edge.

So, as you consider AI’s place in your work, remember that it’s not just about mastering a tool; it’s about using it to fuel purposeful, positive change. AI can be a powerful ally, helping you and your team achieve new levels of impact and creativity in the face of constant evolution.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

Get our latest research, tips, and insights on leadership by signing up for our newsletters.

  • Published January 30, 2025
  • 12 Minute Read
  • Download as PDF

Written by

Alexandra Cannon
Alexandra Cannon
Product Manager, AI

With over 12 years of experience at the intersection of business and technology, Alexandra draws on her expertise to launch innovative products and drive internal efficiencies at CCL. Passionate about making complex topics accessible, she also helps leaders understand and leverage cutting-edge technology, such as generative AI solutions.

With over 12 years of experience at the intersection of business and technology, Alexandra draws on her expertise to launch innovative products and drive internal efficiencies at CCL. Passionate about making complex topics accessible, she also helps leaders understand and leverage cutting-edge technology, such as generative AI solutions.

What to Explore Next

Article
Direction + Alignment + Commitment (DAC) = Leadership

You need direction, alignment, and commitment (DAC) to make leadership happen in your group or organization. Learn more about our DAC framework and how leadership is a social process to foster more of it in your group or organization.

Webinar
Leading Through Change

Understanding the stages employees go through during a transition leads to faster and more productive change efforts. Watch this webinar to learn how to recognize the process of transition and understand the 3 C’s of leading yourself and others through change.

Article
How to Be a Successful Change Leader

Productive change doesn’t happen by itself. Effective change leaders know how to manage the change process and guide people through change with these 3 elements.

Article
Overcome Change Fatigue & Embrace Continual Evolution

Follow these 4 steps to help your workforce overcome change fatigue and build change resilience, which will foster a more innovative organizational culture.

Article
What Senior Executives Told Us About Change-Capable Leadership

Change-capable leadership is about how to forge a common direction around change, and how to align people and resources toward the new direction. Learn more about how to lead change in your organization.

Related Solutions

CCL Regional Headquarters

AMERICAS

+1 336 545 2810
ccl.org

EUROPE, MIDDLE EAST, AFRICA

+32 (0) 2 679 09 10
ccl.org/emea

ASIA-PACIFIC, INDIA, CHINA

+65 6854 6000
ccl.org/apac

About CCL

At the Center for Creative Leadership, our drive to create a ripple effect of positive change underpins everything we do. For 50+ years, we've pioneered leadership development solutions for leaders at every level, from community leaders to CEOs. Consistently ranked among the top global providers of executive education, our research-based programs and solutions inspire individuals at every level in organizations across the world — including 2/3 of the Fortune 1000 — to ignite remarkable transformations.

At the Center for Creative Leadership, our drive to create a ripple effect of positive change underpins everything we do. For 50+ years, we've pioneered leadership development solutions for leaders at every level, from community leaders to CEOs. Consistently ranked among the top global providers of executive education, our research-based programs and solutions inspire individuals at every level in organizations across the world — including 2/3 of the Fortune 1000 — to ignite remarkable transformations.

Get our latest insights delivered to your inbox: ccl.org/subscribe.