Stop pretending to understand AI and start listening to the 25-year-olds.
Recently, I sat in on a presentation where several junior developers explained how AI could automate our customer support workflow. The room was full of VPs nodding politely, clearly lost.
Then something clicked. These weren’t just “tech-savvy kids.” They were the canaries in the coal mine of business transformation.
Here’s what I’ve learned after investing in hundreds of companies and sitting on numerous boards: The future always shows up in the junior ranks first.
While senior management debates AI strategy in theoretical terms, entry-level employees are already using ChatGPT to write better emails, Claude to analyze data, and automation tools to eliminate manual tasks.
They see opportunities we miss because they’re not protecting legacy systems. They’re not invested in “the way we’ve always done things.”
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Three questions every CEO should ask their youngest employees:
1. What repetitive work could AI eliminate from your day?
2. What customer problems could AI solve that we’re not addressing?
3. What would you build if you had unlimited AI resources?
The companies that win the AI revolution won’t be the ones with the biggest consulting budgets. They’ll be the ones that flip the org chart upside down and let the digital natives lead.
Your competitive advantage isn’t hiring more AI experts.
It’s recognizing that you already employ them. They’re just not in corner offices yet.
This is really, really, really good advice.
It’s not just the CEO – it’s everyone in management. We have senior developers who don’t want to use AI, while the juniors are using it everywhere. I have to force it.