Brave New AI World

Mark Mullaly is president of Interthink Consulting Incorporated, an organizational development and change firm specializing in the creation of effective organizational project management solutions. Since 1990, it has worked with companies throughout North America to develop, enhance and implement effective project management tools, processes, structures and capabilities. Mark was most recently co-lead investigator of the Value of Project Management research project sponsored by PMI. You can read more of his writing at markmullaly.com.

  Artificial Intelligence  

Seemingly overnight, there has been an explosion in the presence, prevalence and relevance of artificial intelligence. From a mystical and abstract idea limited to mammoth supercomputers, to something now readily available in your nearest web browser. It’s all a bit magical and wondrous, with a side of helping of cautious wariness. What does it all mean, how does it work, and just what does it promise for the future?

These are important questions to ask. Getting practical and honest answers is somewhat more complicated. As with any new technology, there is a great deal of hype around AI and its potential, not to mention some pretty grandiose claims about what it can do already. Sorting through what’s real and what is rhetoric is an essential challenge. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be striving to sift through the noise and din surrounding AI in search of some signal.

This is a complicated undertaking. For all of the recent revelations regarding AI, there has been an incredible amount of work done over the last few decades in advancing the state of the art. For anyone that hasn’t been paying a lot of close attention to the progress and developments—in which years felt incremental, and now can feel completely overwhelming—getting a realistic sense of where things are is difficult. There is so much happening, and things have evolved so …

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