Brian Evergreen is an internationally recognised strategist and author, celebrated for his pioneering expertise in the future of work and artificial intelligence. As the former Global Head of Autonomous AI Co-Innovation at Microsoft and author of Autonomous Transformation, Brian helps Fortune 500 companies rethink how they integrate AI, emphasising leadership strategies that empower people and create meaningful, sustainable value.
Named one of the world’s top AI speakers, Brian is renowned for guiding business leaders to harness AI not merely as a tool for efficiency, but as a catalyst for purposeful, lasting impact. In this exclusive Q&A, Brian Evergreen shares expert insights on how organisations can move beyond misconceptions, adopt human-centred AI strategies, and prepare for the profound shifts reshaping the future of work.
Q: Many business leaders today are bombarded with promises around AI, especially about data. From your expert perspective, what are the most common misconceptions leaders hold about the role of data versus expertise in artificial intelligence?
Brian Evergreen: The biggest misconceptions that business leaders have about artificial intelligence often lie in the belief that data is the most important aspect of AI.
They have been told this by people trying to sell data as part of their solution or platform — which is very understandable, as that is what they would focus on. But when it comes to artificial intelligence, the most important element is actually expertise.
The whole goal of AI is to recreate semblances of expertise that can be applied inside a business context. And yes, data is an asset that can be part of that. But if you start with your data instead of starting with your expertise, it’s rather like reading the exhaust fumes of a car and trying to figure out where it should go next — as opposed to first starting with your experts and determining what it is we want to do with our business, how we are going to apply intelligence — both human intelligence and machine intelligence — to be able to do that effectively, and then build the actual solutions and products you want to create to deliver value for your customers.
Q: There’s a growing fear among employees that AI will replace human jobs. In your view, what leadership approaches are essential to ensure AI empowers and amplifies the workforce, rather than simply cutting costs or displacing people?
Brian Evergreen: The way organisations can implement AI to empower their workforce rather than replace it is a question I get all the time — and I think it’s a really important one.
What I would say, first and foremost, is that cutting costs with AI is a bit like cave painting with AI. The real opportunity with artificial intelligence and these advanced technologies we have at our disposal today is not just to cut costs on whatever existing value we have already created, but instead to raise and increase top-line revenue and add new value — create new value — based on your core competency.
That’s the first point I’d make about how to double down on applying AI in a way that empowers your workforce. The second point is that it’s really a leadership question.
People sometimes say, “Well, is AI coming for my job?” The thing I always remind them is: AI has never come to a business and knocked on the door saying, “Hi, I’d like that person’s job, and I’d like that person’s job.” AI is not coming; it’s not embodied; it’s not looking for a job.
So, the real question of whether or not AI — and how AI — will be implemented inside an organisation comes down to the leadership and the decisions that leaders are making.
I always remind people: if you’re wondering how your AI is going to impact your own work, look to your leadership. If they are the kind of leadership that says, “Hey, as we look at this era of technology and AI that we’re now entering, we’re planning on using the same values that we always have, and we want to augment and extend the amount of value that we can create with AI,” then you know you’re in a good place for the future of work.
Q: As we look ahead to the future of work, what do you see as the most transformative shifts businesses should anticipate — particularly regarding agentic intelligence and the evolution beyond digital transformation?
Brian Evergreen: The biggest changes that businesses should prepare for — I would say one of the most significant is agentic intelligence.
We’re moving past the era of digital transformation into the era of autonomous transformation — not where organisations autonomously transform, but where the mile marker has moved from going from analogue to digital, now towards autonomous.
By that, I don’t mean fully autonomous — just like a business isn’t fully digital. There are still analogue assets, and there are people involved in every business. The same will be true as organisations move towards more and more autonomy.
One of the biggest changes is agentic intelligence. When you think about the work you do today, most organisations have a lot of robotic process automation; they have different digital processes, where you assign a task and start something, and then multiple things happen online just automatically.
That’s going to come to a new level when we have agentic intelligence — where, instead of everything being automatically started by us or by something that’s triggered based on a certain condition, there will be AI agents inside our organisations that will be able to sense when things are going on or when different dynamics are changing, and they’ll be able to engage us.
Over the weekend, they could come to us first thing on Monday morning with a report: “These are all the different changes that have been noted. We’ve analysed this research question you asked us on Friday. Here are all the different things we recommend, recommended actions, and likely outcomes based on all of them.” We will be able to approve or say, “No, actually, will you dig deeper into that?”
That’s one of the biggest shifts. Another major shift coming is that the way we work between organisations is going to completely change.
Today, if I wanted to check — let’s say I’m a manufacturer, and someone says, “Well, can you manufacture this many parts of this product by this date?” Depending on the size of the order, I might have to check upstream, call around and say, “Okay, can you get us this much of the raw material for us to be able to manufacture this by the date?”
It can be very time-intensive to make all those phone calls and interact between organisations across an entire value stream. But in the era of agentic intelligence, that can be answered in milliseconds because an agent on behalf of my organisation can interact with agents on behalf of my suppliers.
They can, in a matter of milliseconds, answer the question and come back to the customer saying, “Yes, that’s something we absolutely can do.”
