A leader’s take on six applications of ChatGPT in organisational leadership

30 Apr

This is the first in a two-part blog on the artificial intelligence (AI) tool ChatGPT. The second blog will focus on the six biggest dangers of ChatGPT.

After much delay, I finally decided to test out ChatGPT. As someone with senior leadership experience in a large organisation, I wanted to explore the many and varied ways in which the tool might be deployed. What was I expecting? I really don’t know.

Today, AI, particularly its predictive and reactive capabilities are part and parcel of our daily lives. They do our shopping, make telephone calls and so much more. However, the curiosity buzz around ChatGPT, its use of reason and logic in engagement, as well as its real-world applications across a myriad of landscapes is of a different order to the “hey Google” variant.

As consumers, we love convenience and ChatGPT offers it by the bucket load. No doubt, just like any other convenience product, once consumers become dependent on it, they will wonder how they ever managed without it. From an organisational perspective, you do not need to be of particularly fertile imagination to see how this tool might be utilised in areas such as policy making, strategic planning, learning and development and organisational dynamics amongst others.

I am mindful that many have written on ChatGPT and AI more broadly and their impact on leadership. Therefore, in this blog, I have made a conscious effort to offer something different. So here is a leader’s take on six applications of ChatGPT in organisational leadership.

1. Refining the science of leadership development

It is likely that ChatGPT will help organisations to refine leadership recruitment and development into an objective science. Utilising the tool, what I found most impressive was its capacity for reason and logic as well as the ability to present cogent and balanced arguments. There appears to be an obvious application here in determining the suitability of leaders for training and development. As a case in point, if I were looking to identify and target suitable candidates for an advanced leadership development programme, I could engage ChatGPT to design the parameters of that programme and seek its advice on the most suitable candidates to target.

2. Development of leadership archetypes

A potentially fascinating, but entirely logical direction for ChatGPT utilisation is in the development of leadership archetypes. How might this work? Let’s say that an organisation is looking to recruit a specific type of leader to work in a high-pressure environment or on a complex and highly sensitive project, ChatGPT could be used to define the most appropriate leadership archetype or personality type for that role. Going forward, it would offer organisations something approaching off-the-shelf leadership solutions to enable them to recruit directly or through talent agencies.

3. Leadership appraisals

Expect to see ChatGPT co-opted in the leadership performance appraisal process. Initially, one can imagine it being deployed as an evaluative aid to complement human insight and intelligence. However, as its judgement becomes either more reliable or increasingly relied upon, it may well become the default for decisions relating to performance-related pay awards or suitability for promotion. This kind of application may be prevalent amongst managers who are inclined to avoid conflict with their subordinates and absolve themselves of responsibility for making difficult decisions.

4. As part of the executive decision-making process

I doubt that ChatGPT will be referenced in an organisation’s annual report as a member of its senior leadership team, any time soon. However, that won’t be necessary. To begin with, whilst I believe that most of ChatGPTs work will be at middle level leadership and below, that will rapidly change as proof of the product’s efficacy is demonstrated. At such a time, do not be surprised if ChatGPT occupies a ‘seat’ around the executive leadership table, with its opinions on the most important organisational issues being factored into the decision-making process. In the fullness of time, such a practice will be common across all organisations.

5. Psychometric testing

A psychometric test is an objective way to evaluate a candidate’s suitability for a role. Here again, the ChatGPT tool could be used by organisations to design and even evaluate the results of tests given to job applicants, where there is a particular leaning towards enhanced leadership capabilities. Applying this approach, an organisation could reasonably submit responses to questions provided by candidates to ChatGPT for qualitative analysis or task the tool with designing an appropriate test. The goal here would not be to replace the decision-making function of the recruiter with that of AI, but rather to mine the pattern spotting capabilities of the tool and assist and enhance the decision-making process.

6. AI interview panels

I do not think that we are that far away from a time when being interviewed by a robot becomes custom and practice. I mean literally being interviewed by AI, with all the attendant probing and follow up questions that one would expect to see in a human-to-human interaction. In such a scenario expect ChatGPT to move from being a secondary leadership development system to a primary one, with humans in an observational role. There should not be any ethical or moral barriers if application is equitable and consistent with organisational policies.

In conclusion, ChatGPT is very impressive and opens an entirely new landscape of opportunities for organisations to maximise. Even those that might be cautious and even sceptical will eventually embrace it, because not to do so could surrender a critical market edge to their competitors.

As this tool and those being developed to rival it, become even more sophisticated, it seems inevitable that they will be increasingly relied on to perform the most high-level organisational functions including the recruitment of senior leaders and others for specialist leadership roles. After all, why would or should organisations deny themselves the knowledge that could make them better? Notwithstanding, there are risks and even dangers, which will be explored in part-two of this blog: The six biggest dangers of ChatGPT for organisational leadership.

Paul Aladenika