Five AI-Anxieties to Navigate

A fire alarm goes off at work.

Do you:

a. Roll your eyes and ignore it

b. Jump out of your seat and rush to do something

c. Smell the air for smoke, check your watch in case it’s the regular 11 am bell test and then decide how to act

Now, imagine a fire alarm going off in response to every new AI capability breathlessly announced. Do you roll your eyes, jump to action or sniff the air to decide if action is called for? You may identify with one of these positions and likely observe all three play out at work. The first two are symptoms of unbounded anxiety. Unthinking action or inaction are coping mechanisms against anxiety. It’s a way to feel in control even when overwhelmed.

The third response is the practice you want to foster amongst your peers and leaders. However, at the moment there is a lot of AI-induced anxiety which people are struggling to effectively work through. The consequences of this unbounded techno-anxiety are wasteful expenditures, team conflict, reduced productivity, decision avoidance and increasing burnout.

AI Anxiety Effects

I’m consistently hearing that it’s very evident to many executives that anxiety levels are elevated individually and organizationally. AI is just one source along with sociopolitics, climate and other technology-driven opportunities and implications. It’s paralyzing and much of the noise is a defence against anxiety rather than doing real work of building better organizations, products or services by working through complex challenges and emergent events.

Given anxiety is the presence of a non-specific fear, when activated by a broad concept and fields like general or generative AI it easily leads to stuckness. Generative AI in particular seems to trigger strongly delusional discussions and behaviours—much like the software itself. Some are highly euphoric and others deeply cynical. Both extremes erode resilience and performance. As typical, reality is somewhere in the middle.

An antidote to AI delusion that I’ve found helpful is to illuminate, make salient, and thus moderate the AI-anxiety pulsing through the veins of organizations. Categorizing the types of anxiety triggers that people are experiencing enables them to find a pathway to name, explain, claim and eventually tame their specific fears. Some fears will be perceptive and emotive while others will be tangible and complex to navigate.

It’s also helpful to remember that software is dematerialized. Unlike physical engineering whose properties we can physically see, touch and feel, AI software works invisibly behind the screen. The systems are so vast and interconnected that even leading engineers don’t fully know or control how everything works. Hence multiple forms of anxiety can trigger regressive emotional responses to AI.

AI-Anxiety Triggers:

Unbounded - can be utilized in any human process or function in some way (i.e. complexity anxiety)
Immaterial - cannot be held or even seen when working (i.e. black box anxiety)
Emergent - constantly evolving knowledge that no one person can master (i.e. learning anxiety)
Existential - questions ways of living and making a living (i.e. annihilation anxiety)
Unequal - creates conflictual negotiations of how the costs and benefits are shared (i.e. moral anxiety)

The intensity of your response to each trigger will be unique to your valences. Each person will have a naturally positive or negative response to each with low to high intensities. The important thing isn't to deny or repress the response. Instead, it can be used as a helpful signal to activate curiosity, careful planning, intentional action, and reflective evaluation of results. To deny anxiety’s presence is illogical in any change process. It will eventually surface in failed projects, underwhelming performance, arguments or burnout.

However, engaging in a thoughtful and informed way can lead to creativity, empowerment and performance. If you engage at the group level be sure you are trained or supported by someone knowledgeable in group dynamics. Nonetheless, many have found these triggers helpful in evaluating their own responses and where opportunity or resistance are hiding.

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Learn more about Brett’s leadership development practice for global innovation and change professionals.

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