There is a necessary distinction to be made between "cold tech" and "warm tech." Cold tech puts machines first. Warm tech puts humanity first. It's important to balance the two.
Terence Mauri, founder of Hack Future Lab and leadership consultant to Google, Pfizer, HSBC and other companies, presents an example of managing with cold tech in his recent book, The Upside of Disruption (2024).
Delta Cafes introduced artificial intelligence and machine learning into its coffee stores to analyze staff productivity. Within a month, the speed of serving coffee increased by 33%. That is a significant positive gain in one of the company’s key performance indicators (KPIs).
As KPIs increased in a positive direction, however, two key behavioral indicators (KBIs) started to erode: Customer complaints about the quality of the coffee increased, and employee morale decreased because workers felt they were under constant electronic surveillance.
The Delta Cafes case is an example of the dangers when leadership focuses on cold........