#133—Ethan Mollick: How AI Will Enhance—Not Replace—Our Work

Outthinkers

Ethan Mollick, is the Ralph J. Roberts Distinguished Faculty Scholar and Associate Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he studies the effects of artificial intelligence on work, entrepreneurship, and education. His academic research has been published in leading journals, and his work on AI is widely applied, leading him to be named one of TIME Magazine’s Most Influential People in Artificial Intelligence. Ethan also writes to a wider audience about AI, including in his book, Co-Intelligence, a New York Times bestseller.

In addition to his research and teaching, Ethan is the Co-Director of the Generative AI Labs at Wharton, which build prototypes and conduct research to discover how AI can help humans thrive while mitigating risks. Prior to his time in academia, Ethan co-founded a startup company, and he advises numerous organizations. He received his PhD and MBA from MIT’s Sloan School of Management and his bachelor’s degree from Harvard University.

In this episode, we discuss:

• What people get wrong when people think about how AI will shape the workforce.
• What he calls the 'Centaur versus Cyborg' approach—the misconception that work must be divided between humans and AI, rather than completed in unison.
• What preliminary studies, in the past few years between organizations like BCG, Harvard, and MIT, have to tell us about how AI powers human productivity and work itself.
• What history teaches us about adopting new technologies like AI to maintain a competitive edge.

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Episode Timeline:
00:00—Highlight from today's episode
01:07—Introducing Ethan+ the topic of today’s episode
03:04—If you really know me, you know that...
03:24—Ethan's background and journey into AI
04:53—What is your definition of strategy?
06:20—Common misconceptions about AI's impact on the workforce
07:46—AI's capabilities compared to humans, particularly in creativity
10:03—The best way to use AI for idea generation
10:37—AI's role in the different stages of strategy development
13:12—The BCG study on AI's impact on consulting work Bring Us Together
13:58—The concept of Agentive AI
14:48—Lessons from past general purpose technology adoptions
16:33— The need for organizational redesign in the age of AI
19:18—The impact of AI on profit distribution across industries
20:40—AI's role in identifying market needs and finding solutions
22:38—The importance of experimentation with AI
24:50—Addressing the issue of AI's unexplainable solutions
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Additional Resources:
Link to book: Co-Intelligence
Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/emollick
Substack: @oneusefulthing
X: emollick

Thank you to our guest. Thank you to our executive producer, Karina Reyes, our editor, Zach Ness, and the rest of the team. If you like what you heard, please follow, download, and subscribe. I'm your host, Kaihan Krippendorff. Thank you for listening.
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