How to Manage (Not Control!) AI-Enabled Employees

Welcome to Leading Disruption, a weekly letter about disruptive leadership in a transforming world. Every week, we’ll discover how the best leaders set strategy, build culture, and manage uncertainty to drive disruptive, transformative growth. For more insights like these, join my private email list.

Suppose you’ve ever been the parent of a teenager. In that case, you know exactly what it’s like when they first realize their newfound power—when they discover they have autonomy, agency, and independence. 

It’s overwhelming, isn’t it? Sure, you want your child to grow into a free-thinking adult, but, oof, that rebellious phase can be brutal. You’re left to wonder: 

“How much freedom should I give them?”

“What’s within my control?”

“What decisions can I still make?”

My kids are well past this stage, but I remember it well. And I’m reminded of it constantly, namely because I see this same scenario playing out in nearly every organization that is adopting generative AI technologies. Employees are getting their hands on these tools, and they’re beginning to feel like those teenagers who’ve discovered a renewed sense of power and independence. They can do so much more than they ever could before, and, as with any good rebellious phase, they’ll start to leverage that power.

They won’t need to wait for permission to start using these tools—so many of them are ubiquitous in our browsers and on our phones. They won’t sit quietly. Because when they see untapped potential, they’ll speak out and ask why their teams aren’t moving faster.  

If you haven’t caught on, the worried parent is you. As their manager, you’re facing not just an evolution but a revolution on the part of your employees who want to use AI to improve their jobs, likely so they can accomplish more. And although that’s undoubtedly a good thing, this new dynamic will require you to reassess your relationship with your AI-enabled employees. How you lead them will have to change. A step further, you’ll have to lead the change—this transformation surrounding generative AI—itself. 

It makes you kind of miss those angsty teen years, huh?

The 4 Types of Employees

This parent-teen dynamic aside, you’re likely to run into four different types of employees, or “followers,” as Professor Robert Kelly outlined in his classic followership model published in 1988 by the Harvard Business Review.

1. Sheep

You may have sheep on your team who wait for someone to tell them what to do. Usually, their leaders are shepherds telling them where to go. 

2. Yes People

You could also have “yes people,” who are slightly more eager but generally don’t bring critical thinking to the table. They tend to agree with whatever their leader advises. 

3. Alienated Followers

You could have employees who were once engaged and effective but have given up their drive. Often disgruntled, they no longer take initiative. 

4. Effective Followers

But then you’ve got critical thinkers who are also active, they're known as “effective followers.” The dream, right? In theory, yes, but in reality, many managers are challenged by these employees, who often see themselves as partners and collaborators. Like the rebellious teenager, they want to revolutionize the way things work.

As a leader, you have a choice with those effective followers: You can tamp down their eagerness and creativity, which will inevitably alienate them or turn them into sheep or yes people. Or you can encourage their critical thinking.

The 2 Types of Managers

I’ve also found there are generally two different types of managers out there: 

1. The Sage on the Stage

In traditional “command and control” leadership models, managers were promoted into their positions because they did their job better than everyone else and therefore were in a position to tell everyone else how to do their jobs.  

This style of leadership—in which the leader is in the front—doesn’t necessarily work anymore.

2. The Guide on the Side

Now, it seems downright obvious that employees can do the job better than their manager could: They are the ones doing the tasks every single day, and so, of course, they are learning how to do those tasks better and more effectively. 

It takes a very different type of leader to stop leading from the front and instead step to the side to work with employees as partners. 

However, you can still provide knowledge, experience, background, and guidance when you are side by side. Still, it’s a very different role for leaders. Instead of telling people what to do, it requires being open to asking more questions.

Interestingly, organizations that have undergone this latter type of leadership transformation are much more likely to move quickly into the generative AI space. They adapt to new technologies more fluidly, with more cohesiveness, intention, and strategy. 

The Fallacy of Control—And How to Break Free

The reason managers foster sheep and yes men, and why they often vie to lead from the front instead of the side, is all because of one central concern: Control.

Throughout my years researching disruptive transformation, a central fear of the leaders I’ve met is losing control or letting go of it. 

My question back to them is this: Were you ever in control in the first place?

Think about it: Leadership is a relationship that you have with your employees, but you fundamentally do not control relationships. Consider your friends. Do you control those relationships? Absolutely not. If you’re blessed to have a loving spouse or partner, do you control them? The answer better be no. 

So, why do you assume you must control the relationships with your employees when you come to work? 

It’s because of hierarchies. 

Now, hierarchies aren’t inherently bad. In fact, they can be extremely useful. The problem is when they get in the way of a relationship that’s needed for you to be the most effective leader possible to create change. So when there’s an 18-layer-deep hierarchy up and down an organization, you may be too preoccupied with your placement—who is above you, who is below you, and where you fit in—to see beyond the org chart. 

If you think of hierarchies as a way of parsing out work, and not about cultivating control, you can begin to break free from a management style rooted in fear and scarcity. You can worry less and strategize more. You can set your mind to how best to nurture these “effective followers” for the betterment of them, you, and the entire organization.

I know it’s easier said than done. Giving up control and rethinking hierarchies is incredibly disruptive.

It’s unsettling to no longer know where we stand in the world or what our future holds. Yet this is what separates managers maintaining the status quo from true leaders of transformative change, and it’s the key reason why we must step up to become them.

Your Turn

How has your leadership already changed with the onset of AI? How do you anticipate it changing as your employees become more highly empowered? What will you do to nurture them?