Which strategic decisions should we keep human-led?

Use AI to broaden your assessment of possible directions by organising data, identifying patterns and exploring scenarios. AI-assisted analysis can help surface industry trends, potential audience segments, opportunities and anomalies. It can also support predictive modelling and an assessment of current brand performance, giving leaders a wider view of where a brand stands and what options might lie ahead.

Treat the resulting options as inputs to a strategic assessment, not confirmation that an opportunity will succeed. Use what-if scenarios to explore possible directions and their likelihood, while keeping the distinction between an analytical output and a decision to act. The practical role for AI is to inform the choice, not settle it.

Retain responsibility for the strategic choice: which opportunities to pursue, which risks to accept and what future to work towards. AI can organise messy information, help identify audiences and point out risks. A clear point of view and a core brand strategy remain human responsibilities, along with judging how to move an audience rather than merely identify one.

Human ingenuity, empathy and co-creation also matter when imagining different futures under uncertainty. Challenge an AI-generated list of options for underlying similarity rather than assuming that different wording represents different strategic possibilities. A 2025 study reported by the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, found that ChatGPT-assisted brainstorming produced significantly lower idea diversity in 37 of 45 statistical comparisons across 5 experiments involving brainstorming tasks. Keep human perspectives involved in developing alternatives as well as choosing between them.