Will CEOs eventually have to replace themselves with AI to please shareholders?
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Loyalty lasts right up until the math says otherwise.
The math has never made sense for CEOs
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From what people on Lemmy say, a CEO (and board) isn't there to do a good job they are there to be a fall guy if something goes wrong, protecting shareholders from prosecution. Can AI do that?
How do they take the fall exactly,"millions in a golden parachute, and high-fives on the way to next ceo job?" At least you could turn the AI off.
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They do indeed make strategic decisions, just only in favor of the short term profits of shareholders. It’s “strategy” that a 6 yr old could execute, but strategy nonetheless
This is closer to what I mean by strategy and decisions: https://matthewdwhite.medium.com/i-think-therefore-i-am-no-llms-cannot-reason-a89e9b00754f
LLMs can be helpful for informing strategy, and simulating strings of words that may can be perceived as a strategic choice, but it doesn't have it's own goal-oriented vision.
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Buddam tsssss! I too enjoy making fun of big business CEOs as mindless trend-followers. But even "following a trend" is a strategy attributable to a mind with reasoning ability that makes a choice. Now the quality of that reasoning or the effectiveness of that choice is another matter.
As tempting as it is, dehumanizing people we find horrible also risks blinding us to our own capacity for such horror as humans.
Y’know, the whole “don’t dehumanize the poor biwwionaiwe’s :(((” works for like, nazis, because they weren’t almost all clinical sociopaths.
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How do they take the fall exactly,"millions in a golden parachute, and high-fives on the way to next ceo job?" At least you could turn the AI off.
I mean, that's one way it happens. CEOs can serve different purposes, but a CEO who's job it is is to be hated and take the blame for actions the board company wants done then get fired with a payout and move on to the next job? That's definitely a thing.
An AI wouldn't be able to do that job because they can't be fired. Or on second thought, the board can change the AI program to a different company every few years.
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Y'all are all missing the real answer. CEOs have class solidarity with shareholders. Think about about how they all reacted to the death of the United health care CEO. They'll never get rid of them because they're one of them. Rich people all have a keen awareness of class consciousness and have great loyalty to one another.
Us? We're expendable. They want to replace us with machines that can't ask for anything and don't have rights. But they'll never get rid of one of their own. Think about how few CEOs get fired no matter how poor of a job they do.
P.S. Their high pay being because of risk is a myth. Ever heard of a thing called the golden parachute? CEOs never pay for their failures. In fact when they run a company into the ground, they're usually the ones that receive the biggest payouts. Not the employees.
Wouldn't they just remove the CEO from their role and they would just become another rich shareholder?
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch?
Yes. It might be unorthodox at first, but they could just take a vote, and poof, done.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
Wat?
No. What?
So you just used circular logic to make the AI a "person"... maybe you're saying once it is running the corporation, it is the corporation? But no.
Anyway, corporations are "considered people" in the US under the logic that corporations are, at the end of the day, just collections of people. So you can, say, go to a town hall to voice your opinion as an individual. And you can gather up all your friends to come with you, and form a bloc which advocates for change. You might gain a few more friends, and give your group a name, like "The Otter Defence League." In all these scenarios, you and others are using your right to free speech as a collective unit. Citizens United just says that this logic also applies to corporations.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselve
CEOs wouldn't have to "replace themselves" any more than you have to find a replacement if your manager fires you from Dairy Queen.
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
Companies never outsourced the CEO position to countries which traditionally have lower CRO salaries but plenty of competency (e.g. Japan), so they won't do this either. It's because CEOs are controlled by boards, and the boards are made up of CEOs from other companies. They have a vested interest in human CEOs with inflated salaries.
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I guess, but they sure shovel plenty of money at say… Musk. So what? Is he worth a trillion? It seems the boards could trim a ton of money if ceos did nothing. Or they do lots and it’s all worth it. Who’s to say.
I just don’t see LLMs as the vehicle to unseat CEOs, or maybe I’m small minded idk.
Musk is a shareholder. He own large parts of the companies he's the CEO of
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
I could imagine a world where whole virtual organizations could be spun up, and they can just run in the background creating whole products, marketing them, and doing customer support, etc.
Right now the technology doesn't seem there yet, but it has been rapidly improving, so we'll see.
I could definitely see rich CEOs funding the creation of a "celebrity" bot that answers questions the way they do. Maybe with their likeness and voice, so they can keep running companies from beyond the grave. Throw it in one of those humanoid robots and they can keep preaching the company mission until the sun burns out.
What a nightmare.
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
Non-founder CEO's typically get brought in to use their connections to improve the company of is an internal promotion to signify the new direction of the company. They also provide a single throat to choke when things go wrong.
What will be more likely to happen is that CEO's will use AI to vibe manage their companies and use the AI output as justification. We don't have enough data to tell if AI helps the best or worst CEO's.
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
That would free up a whole shitload of money for the citizens! /s
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
Would be cool & funny if they did.
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I could imagine a world where whole virtual organizations could be spun up, and they can just run in the background creating whole products, marketing them, and doing customer support, etc.
Right now the technology doesn't seem there yet, but it has been rapidly improving, so we'll see.
I could definitely see rich CEOs funding the creation of a "celebrity" bot that answers questions the way they do. Maybe with their likeness and voice, so they can keep running companies from beyond the grave. Throw it in one of those humanoid robots and they can keep preaching the company mission until the sun burns out.
What a nightmare.
Check out the novel Accelerando by Charles Stross, that thing is part of the plot.
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Check out the novel Accelerando by Charles Stross, that thing is part of the plot.
Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check it out!
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Loyalty lasts right up until the math says otherwise.
One must include social capital in the math
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I mean, that's one way it happens. CEOs can serve different purposes, but a CEO who's job it is is to be hated and take the blame for actions the board company wants done then get fired with a payout and move on to the next job? That's definitely a thing.
An AI wouldn't be able to do that job because they can't be fired. Or on second thought, the board can change the AI program to a different company every few years.
I accept your proposal to turn off ceos when there leadership results in the death and injury of humans.
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That would free up a whole shitload of money for the citizens! /s
That will be a whole shitload of money for the shareholders
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Non-founder CEO's typically get brought in to use their connections to improve the company of is an internal promotion to signify the new direction of the company. They also provide a single throat to choke when things go wrong.
What will be more likely to happen is that CEO's will use AI to vibe manage their companies and use the AI output as justification. We don't have enough data to tell if AI helps the best or worst CEO's.
wrote last edited by [email protected]United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson was utilizing AI technology to mass murder people for shareholder profit
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If AI ends up running companies better than people, won’t shareholders demand the switch? A board isn’t paying a CEO $20 million a year for tradition, they’re paying for results. If an AI can do the job cheaper and get better returns, investors will force it.
And since corporations are already treated as “people” under the law, replacing a human CEO with an AI isn’t just swapping a worker for a machine, it’s one “person” handing control to another.
That means CEOs would eventually have to replace themselves, not because they want to, but because the system leaves them no choice. And AI would be considered a "person" under the law.
wrote last edited by [email protected]If AI ends up running companies better than people
Okay, important context there. The current AI bubble will burst sooner or later. So, this is hypothetical future AGI.
Yes, if the process of human labour becoming redundant continues uninterrupted, it's highly likely, although since CEOs make their money from the intangible asset of having connections more than the actual work they'll be one of the last to go.
But, it won't continue uninterrupted. We're talking about rapidly transitioning to an entirely different kind of economy, and we should expect it will be similarly destabilising as it was to hunter gatherer societies that suddenly encountered industrial technology.
If humans are still in control, and you still have an entire top 10% of the population with significant equity holdings, there's not going to be much strategy to the initial stages. Front line workers will get laid off catastrophically, basically, and no new work will be forthcoming. The next step will be a political reaction. If some kind of make-work program is what comes out of it, human managers will still find a place in it. If it's basic income, probably not. (And if there's not some kind of restriction on the top end of wealth, as well, you're at risk of creating a new ruling elite with an incentive to kill everyone else off, but that's actually a digression from the question)
When it comes to the longer term, I find inspiration in a blog post I read recently. Capital holdings will eventually become meaningless compared to rights to natural factors. If military logic works at all the same way, and there's ever any kind of war, land will once again be supreme among them. There weren't really CEOs in feudalism, and even if we manage not to regress to autocracy there probably won't be a place for them.
