Why AI Cannot Be Forced on Your Company From the Top Down

A mandate is a tempting tool. The CEO announces the company is going AI, budgets appear and everybody moves. The trouble is that AI responds badly to being required. Most of the stalled AI programmes I have seen had one thing in common. They were driven by decree from the top. ## What a mandate actually produces Compliance. With AI, compliance is close to worthless. These tools are only as useful as the way people use them. How well somebody asks, and whether they try again when the first answer is poor, decides almost everything. A team using AI because it was told to will use it as little as it can get away with, on small tasks, and never on the decisions where the value sits. ## What does work Real AI use grows out of individual curiosity. The people getting the most from it went looking. They tried things, got them wrong and tried again, and they built habits long before anybody wrote a process. You cannot order curiosity. You can make it safe. Take away the fear of looking foolish. It is the biggest barrier I see, and only leaders can remove it, openly and where people can see. Hand people problems instead of tools. "Use AI in your work" goes nowhere. "Here is a problem we have been stuck on for months, see whether AI helps" gets people going, and they find the tools on the way. Celebrate the attempts as well as the wins. If only successes get recognised, everybody learns that trying is risky. Recognise the person who tried something, learned from it and told their colleagues, whatever the result. ## What leaders are for The leaders I see getting this right give permission. They ask their teams, openly, which tools they are using. They use the tools themselves where people can see. Budget matters less than people expect. The companies furthest ahead with AI are usually the ones where trying something new is safe. --- ## Working Together If this is close to where your business is right now, I would like to hear about it. I work with a small number of clients at a time and I read every message myself. Email [me@martins.com.ng](mailto:me@martins.com.ng), read [how I work](/work-with-me), or connect with me on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/stanmartins).