Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management. Providing Norges Bank Investment Management
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It’s no surprise that implementing AI has a steep learning curve. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth the effort.
If you want to be a future-proof business leader, you need to “force yourself” to use AI, said Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management. of fortune Peter Vanham said in an interview with Fortune Connect last week: of fortune Executive Leadership Community.
Whether you’re already a tech whiz, or whether your particular role relies on generative AI like ChatGPT, you’ll be able to stay up to date on its applications and potential next turns. It’s a leader’s duty. That’s certainly the case with Tagen. He manages the world’s largest single investor, the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund. The fund has stakes in over 9,000 of his global companies, including Apple, Nestle, Microsoft and Samsung, and owns approximately 1.5% of all publicly traded companies worldwide.
As with many of the largest Fortune 500 companies, the adoption of AI cannot be overlooked. And executives and general employees alike shouldn’t wait to upskill.Recent luck A survey of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies reveals that predictive AI, best suited for analyzing large amounts of data, is the technology they expect to create the most business opportunities in the next decade. I was.
Being from an older generation or simply being estranged is no excuse, Tangen said. “If you’re older and don’t have much experience, get younger people to help,” Tangen advised. The new version of AI “upended the seniority value a bit,” he added.
But young workers may be different. The idea that the younger you are, the more you know about AI may be a misconception. According to a recent Dell Technologies survey, nearly 40% of Gen Z employees believe their college education has not adequately prepared them for the technology-related needs of the modern workplace. increase. More than half said they have “very basic” digital know-how or none at all. Luckily, they grew up very online, so they’re more likely to pick it up quickly and become AI natives.
And ultimately, it’s a good thing for younger workers to educate older workers, Tangen said. “It’s very democratic software. Even an idiot like me can get value out of it because it’s basically just talking to machines,” he laughs. “It’s really incredibly powerful.”
harness the power
Mr. Tangen’s expectations and concerns are perfectly aligned with those of other key executives. Pearson Education CEO Andy Bird recently told Fortune Connect that most workers have no choice but to become AI-savvy to remain competitive in the job market. said.
“In many ways, technology and AI are advancing faster than real life,” Byrd says. “We are struggling to keep up. The impact of that on us as individuals and as a company is the need to continually reskill and upskill.”
In fact, AI has permeated the day-to-day operations of thousands of companies. At French pharmaceutical and healthcare giant Sanofi, 9,000 people (10% of the company) use AI every day, company CEO Paul Hudson told Fortune Connect. “The following companies will emerge.” [don’t adopt A.I., and] I’m really trying to hold people back,” Hudson added. “I don’t think they can compete.”
Tangen echoed Hudson and Byrd, saying AI was “just completely transformative.” Applications like ChatGPT and its growing list of competitors are transforming everything people do in and out of the office.
“In my head it’s going very fast. It’s like being on Apollo 11 and flying out into space,” Tangen told Vanham. “It’s very exciting, but it’s also a little bit scary.” Large-scale deployment may seem daunting, but Tangen is looking to the immediate future.
“We just need to target a 10% productivity improvement within the company over the next 12 months,” he said. It’s not that hard. A recent study from MIT and Stanford University found that AI makes a worker 14% more productive than him. This is good news for bosses and employees alike, unless you are in a job that could be taken over by AI.
