AI in Leadership Teams – Why Is It a Shared Leadership Responsibility?

I have now conducted quite a number of one-to-one AI coaching sessions with leaders, and one thing that continues to strike me is how individually AI is still being approached in many organisations.

I meet leaders who are curious about AI, who are experimenting with the technology and beginning to discover how it can create value in their own leadership practice. Some have come quite far, while others are still building their experience. But when I ask how they work with AI as a leadership team, a rather different picture often emerges.

Even when individual leaders are making good progress, it is far from certain that the leadership team has had a proper discussion about what AI means for their shared leadership responsibilities. And I think that deserves more attention.

Because AI is not just about what individual leaders or employees can use the technology for. It is also a development that affects our tasks, skills, collaboration and expectations of one another. And that makes it something leaders need to address collectively.

When Leaders Take Different Paths

I actually think it is perfectly natural for leaders to approach AI differently. We have different responsibilities, interests and levels of experience, and there is no reason to assume that every leader should use AI to the same extent or in the same way.

But there is a difference between using AI differently and having fundamentally different approaches to leading employees in their use of AI.

Imagine an organisation where one leader actively encourages employees to experiment with AI and gives them time to develop their skills. Another leader is more cautious and expects employees to continue working much as they always have. A third might have high expectations of how much AI should improve efficiency, without necessarily having considered what the time saved should be used for.

None of these three leaders necessarily has the wrong approach. But if these differences are not the result of conscious decisions, the organisation risks developing very different expectations of employees and of how AI should become part of everyday work.

This can mean that some employees have far better opportunities to develop their AI skills than others. That the organisation misses opportunities to rethink processes across departments. Or that different understandings emerge of what good quality and responsible use of AI actually mean.

And at that point, it is no longer just a question of technology. It becomes a question of leadership.

Shared Leadership Does Not Mean Everyone Has to Do the Same Thing

I have previously written about what it means to be an AI-mature organisation and why individual AI skills do not necessarily translate into organisational maturity. Shared learning and knowledge exchange are essential elements of that development.

But I also think we need to take it one step further.

Because it is not enough for leaders simply to share their experiences with AI. The leadership team also needs to use those experiences to consider what kind of development they want to see in the organisation and what conditions need to be in place to support it.

This does not necessarily mean that the leadership team needs to develop a comprehensive AI strategy or agree on exactly how everyone should use the technology. On the contrary, I believe there is considerable value in allowing different professional areas and employees to find their own ways of creating value with AI.

But there should be some shared thinking about the direction.

What do we expect of our employees when it comes to AI? How do we ensure they have opportunities to learn and experiment? What is our approach to quality, responsibility and human judgement? And how do we, as leaders, set an example in the development we want to encourage?

These are not questions that can be answered simply by introducing new technologies or establishing guidelines for their use. They require leadership discussions in which leaders consider both the opportunities and the dilemmas that AI brings.

Leadership Teams Do Not Need to Be AI Experts

One of the challenges I encounter in my coaching sessions is that many leaders are still developing their own AI skills. Naturally, this makes it more difficult to take responsibility for a development they have not yet had much personal experience with.

But I think we need to be careful not to make leaders' own AI skills a prerequisite for even beginning to discuss AI as a shared leadership responsibility.

Leadership teams do not need to have all the answers. Nor do leaders need to be AI experts to ask relevant questions about how the technology affects employees, tasks and the organisation.

What I do believe is important, however, is that leaders are curious and gain some hands-on experience with the technology themselves. It is difficult to develop sound judgement about AI without having experienced both its possibilities and its limitations.

That is why leaders' own competence development and their shared leadership responsibilities are closely connected. Leadership teams need both to develop their understanding of AI and to take responsibility for how that understanding is translated into leadership practice across the organisation.

AI Needs a Place on the Leadership Team's Agenda

From my own years as a leader, I know how many competing priorities demand attention in leadership team meetings. And I can certainly understand why AI sometimes gets pushed aside in favour of the many other tasks and challenges that require immediate attention.

But that is precisely why I believe AI needs a proper place on the leadership team's agenda. Not simply as an update on new tools or ongoing projects, but as a discussion about how AI affects the way we lead and work.

Because if AI is to create value across the organisation, we cannot leave its development entirely to the individual leaders and employees who are furthest ahead. It also requires the leadership team to take shared responsibility for the direction, priorities and conditions that will enable the organisation to succeed.

Perhaps it is therefore worth asking one simple question at your next leadership team meeting:

Have we actually discussed how we want to lead the changes that AI brings – or have we mostly talked about how each of us uses the technology?

---

At Mindtrain, I help leadership teams develop a shared approach to AI. We work with leaders' own use of AI, the leadership dilemmas that arise and the shared principles that can help set the direction for the organisation's continued development.