@DKThomp
A theory I'm testing out about AI, work, and the future of companies ... I have for months been obsessed with Alfred Chandler's The Visible Hand, a classic business-history book that argues that 19th century technology—the telegraph, train—created an explosion of real-time sales and inventory-information challenges, which required the creation of a new org charts with something called "middle managers." Thus, technology birthed managerial capitalism. Thematically, Chandler's insight is that technology doesn't just change jobs; it changes how jobs are organized in relation to each other; which is to say, tech changes how companies are structured. So, how might AI restructure the firm? Here's one stab at an answer: The telegraph/train created a profusion of information, which required managers. But AI's greatest skill is synthesizing information that's already been created. I think that's one reason why new companies are getting rich faster with unusually small staff. The "visible hand" of professional managers is being replaced, at the margin, by the "invisible hands" of digital platforms and AI assistants that don't so much destroy work as they allow new firms to build lean human-AI workflows that are qualitatively different than the larger bureaucracies in their industries.