A New Role in a New World In a role that encompasses everything from sales support to brand steward to chief growth officer, chief marketing officers are bastions of the bottom line and champions of their companies’ aspirations. In the age of disruption, the role has been disrupted, too. Profile of a CMO While there is substantial variation among CMOs across geographies, industries, and organizations of different sizes, marketers traditionally have been responsible for the strategies and execution around identifying opportunities and positioning brands in the marketplace. But traditional competition has become guerilla warfare with unpredictable challengers; customers now choose from a once unfathomable range of options; and brand reputations can be made or broken at lightning speed across social media. CMOs must navigate, and even anticipate these changes while protecting brand assets and expanding market share. Grant Duncan is a former advertising and marketing executive who leads Spencer Stuart’s Digital Practice in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Duncan says, “Traditionally, the great marketers had a fantastic combination of magic and logic. At their core they were analytical, mathematically strong, had strong business acumen, and at the same time had an ability to jump outside of that in a [...]

The business landscape is shifting. Change is constant and the pace is faster. The skills gap is wider and customer focus is narrower. We’ve been disrupted, and we’ve been the disruptors. Now what? In the latest global survey of AESC Members, AESC explored how constant disruption has affected members’ clients, including the impact of tech, the need for creativity, and how leaders are fostering innovative cultures. Tech and Industry: The state of play Sophisticated sensors, real language processing, facial recognition, 3-D printing, predictive analytics, machine learning and the full range of evolving technologies continue to transform industries. Communities, companies, and even broad industrial sectors are adopting technology at different rates and for different purposes, but technology’s ongoing influence on products, processes and populations demands that organizations embrace transformational leadership. In the life sciences sector, “The different technologies that are appearing in the hospital environment put the patient at the center,” David Colorado, Partner in Talengo/TGCL Life Science Practice says. And leveraging that technology “is not just about the amount of data available, it’s really about the expertise that we need to manage the different kinds of technology appearing in the healthcare professions.” He says, “I think we are at the [...]

Ways to find and fix unconscious bias "You cannot trace how you came to the belief that there is a lamp on the desk in front of you, or how you detected a trace of irritation in your spouse’s voice on the telephone, or how you managed to avoid a threat on the road before you became consciously aware of it. The mental work that produces impressions, intuitions, and many decisions goes on in silence in our minds." From the introduction to Thinking Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman. The Brain and Bias We’re not bad, we’re human. It may be time to reconsider the bias we hold against bias, itself. Rooted in the human brain’s automatic processing systems, unconscious decision-making has played an important role in the survival and evolution of species. Candice Bosteels, founder and managing director at IdentiCy explains, “The fundamental fight or flight response is actually an example of unconscious bias. It is based on what feels safe to us in a certain situation. Our experiences, our preferences, our education, our upbringing all contribute to the model of the world we have, and it makes us who we are. That is not necessarily a bad thing--it becomes [...]

What the C-Suite should know about machine ethics "As the use and impact of autonomous and intelligent systems (A/IS) become pervasive, we need to establish societal and policy guidelines in order for such systems to remain human-centric, serving humanity’s values and ethical principles. These systems have to behave in a way that is beneficial to people beyond reaching functional goals and addressing technical problems. This will allow for an elevated level of trust between people and technology that is needed for its fruitful, pervasive use in our daily lives." The IEEE Global Initiative on Ethics of Autonomous and Intelligent Systems. “Ethically Aligned Design: A Vision for Prioritizing Human Well-being with Autonomous and Intelligent Systems, Version 2.” IEEE, 2017. Defining Machine Ethics Algorithms are becoming self-taught and capable of independent decision-making. As intelligent, autonomous systems continue to evolve, human judgment and behavior is influencing machine decision-making. The field of machine ethics involves efforts to ensure that the behavior of AI-enabled machines is ethically acceptable. According to Nell Watson, AI and Robotics Faculty at Singularity University and Co-Founder of EthicsNet, “machine ethics is an emerging domain which is concerned with teaching machines about human values.” Machine ethics should not be confused with [...]

Instances of AI, Machine Learning and Deep Learning are being used around the world today to make data-based decisions that are helping companies make important choices that essentially drive profit altering business results. This is the perfect time to think about how Artificial Intelligence will impact your firm as well as what you can do to ensure you maintain your firm’s high standards and values in this revolutionary digital age. Today, you can bet a good amount of Fortune companies are using AI in some capacity. The most common use-cases for AI implementation are to detect security breaches, resolve user technology issues, automate administrative tasks and gauge internal compliance. In general, AI is allowing brands to serve their customers better in more customized ways. Robots on Boards? A Hong Kong VC firm recently appointed an AI Algorithm to its Board of Directors. They credit the AI with pulling the firm back from the brink of bankruptcy. Japanese venture capital firm, Deep Knowledge, noticed their firm was funding way too many "overhyped projects". The AI solved this problem by helping the firm make more logical, fact-based decisions. This was not the first company to use AI as a decision-making tool for [...]

Artificial intelligence (AI) is an area of computer science that sees intelligent machines behaving and reacting as humans do. Computers with artificial intelligence perform cognitive functions, such as learning, planning, problem-solving, and speech recognition. While there is a science-fiction fuelled misconception of the world being over-run by human-like robots, the reality of AI is far removed from this Hollywood fantasy. The landscape of the everyday is populated with instances of AI. Examples of AI include Siri, Amazon Echo, and Google Dot—even video games, online banking fraud detection, and purchases prediction from online retailers. As the technology advances, the use of AI within the business world is increasing, with many examples in the health care, retail, manufacturing, and sports industries amongst others. There is no doubt that technology is at the heart of many industries—but it is confined, as technology only does what we tell it to do. Another limitation of AI is that it builds on data input, so any inaccuracies or limitations going into machines affects the quality of the results going out. Lukas Neumann, chief engineer and architect at Invenias with a PhD in Artificial Intelligence and a role as research assistant in AI Visual Geometry at Oxford [...]

What's the Story? At the Mintz Group, the due diligence and investigations firm where I am a partner, we conduct background investigations of executive and board candidates on a global basis. An important part of every background check is verifying a candidate’s bona fides, including past employment, educational degrees, professional licenses, board memberships and other types of affiliations. Whereas these credentials always used to be presented in a traditional résumé or curriculum vitae, we are nowadays just as apt to be given a candidate’s LinkedIn profile as we are a résumé or CV. The widespread use of online profiles, most commonly LinkedIn at least in North America, has some clear advantages. For one, LinkedIn profiles tend to be up to date, and are relatively easy to create and revise, while some résumés are more like time capsules, last updated years if not decades ago. But as professional investigators, we don’t view LinkedIn as a replacement for the stalwart résumé. To the contrary, in some ways they are entirely different things. First, the résumé has traditionally been both a private and a personal document. It was meant to be seen by people with a “need to know,” such as human resource [...]