We Monkey-Brain Humans Must Adapt to an AI World. The Tools are Smarter Than Us
The Relationship Between Humans and Our Tools Has Forever Changed
For thousands of years, humans maintained complete control over our tools—we designed them, deployed them, and remained firmly in charge. Throughout history, our tools enhanced our capabilities but were rarely smarter than us. Today, however, AI represents a fundamental shift in this relationship and knowledge worker and we humans, especially knowledge workers earning >$100K/year, need to start adapting.
As AI systems rapidly advance in capability, they're challenging traditional notions of human-tool interaction. Unlike traditional tools that served as passive instruments of human will, modern AI can perform complex cognitive tasks that can (and so always will) exceeding human performance.
Experiencing AI Transformation Firsthand
Here are at GAI Insights, I’m witnessing this transformation first hand through our "AI Factory" initiative. This program blends human AI researchers with AI tools to maximize productivity, insight, personalization and speed.
Parika, one of our research associates, curates GenAI articles for our daily news and case study database. Our process involves finding relevant articles, evaluating them against specific criteria, developing customized takeaways for customers, and submitting final content for a QA review by our human AI analysts.
By using several AI tools to automate specific subtasks in this workflow, Parika saves dozens of hours weekly. Rather than spending time on Google searches or reading entire articles independently, she can focus on higher-value activities where human judgment remains essential—evaluating article relevance, correcting AI-generated content, adjusting tone for different audiences, and providing contextual insights. We scale this process by slowly adding humans and adding AI robots as fast as possible.
The Rapid Acceleration of AI in Knowledge Work
The pace at which AI scales globally and advances technically means best-in-class AI solutions for different knowledge work subtasks are emerging daily. This represents a profound shift particularly for knowledge workers, especially those earning over $100,000 annually, who have traditionally relied on cognitive skills as their primary value proposition.
Major firms are already demonstrating this transition:
Goldman Sachs now employs AI for initial research and memo drafting for deals
Deloitte and McKinsey have reduced thousands of human labor hours by implementing AI for industry research
These organizations have transferred hundreds of thousands of work hours from human professionals to AI systems
From Guild System to AI Collaboration
Much of today's knowledge work operates in a guild-like fashion, similar to manufacturing before the industrial revolution—relying on specialized human expertise transmitted through apprenticeship and experience. However, market forces, including capitalism, AI advancement, and global competition, are driving organizations to automate human labor wherever economically viable.
The emerging paradigm involves agentic AI systems that independently pursue assigned subtasks in controlled fashion, only "consulting humans" when they encounter limitations.
This inverts the traditional relationship: rather than humans using tools, AI will increasingly perform primary work with humans providing supplementary support.
The Near Future of Knowledge Work
For knowledge-intensive fields like law, software development, consulting, auditing, research, film, entertainment, policy analysts, compliance reporting, etc., this transition will accelerate dramatically over the next 24-36 months. We believe that the percentage of work handled by AI versus humans in these fields could shift from roughly 10:90 today to 70:30 or even 90:10 for many sub task categories.
Fields requiring complex physical manipulation or site-specific expertise—such as HVAC installation, construction, and certain healthcare roles—will experience AI-driven changes more gradually.
Becoming Adroit Adapters
My entire career has been in knowledge work (enterprise software) where humans provided approximately 95% of the value and tools contributed roughly 5%. We're rapidly transitioning to a world where these ratios will be reversed for many knowledge tasks.
My stubborn, overconfident, proud "monkey brain"—the evolved human mind that naturally resists fundamental change—is gradually accepting the implications of this new reality.
Adapting successfully to this environment requires several key approaches:
Value-identification: Determining precisely where human judgment, creativity, and emotional intelligence remain superior
AI collaboration skills: Learning to effectively prompt, guide, and review AI outputs
Continuous learning: Developing expertise in emerging areas where humans maintain advantages
Specialization in AI oversight: Becoming skilled at identifying AI limitations and correcting AI-generated work
In this Age of AI, the debate about whether AI changes work is over. The new, essential questions is on the contours of adaptability.
Those who seamlessly integrate their uniquely human capabilities with advancing AI tools will thrive, while those who cling to traditional knowledge work models will find themselves increasingly marginalized or unemployed.
The future belongs not to those who resist this transformation, but to those who recognize it and strategically position themselves as indispensable within a new human-AI tool relationship.
I’ve been raving about OpenAI Deep Research product for weeks — put in a prompt, wait 10 minutes and get a 15 page research paper will full citations.
But, it was only available at $200/mo from OpenAI.
Today, it’s available in the $20/mo. It’s amazing for research. Let me know what you think.
Alden did a great overview of all the different types of AI Research models at this week’s Learning Lab. Watch here.
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Join us Fri, March 14 at Noon with executives from 3 major health insurance companies: BCBS of Michigan, Horizon BCBS of New Jersey and Cambia Health Solutions. Sign up here
Many companies tell us that it is important for them to offer a Secure Employee ChatBot this year for 10-30% of their employees to improve productivity and employee satisfaction. To reduce confusion, our AI Analysts compiled this feature comparison guide.
Goldman Sachs now has Secure Employee ChatBot to 20% of its 50,000 employees and aims to have 100% coverage by year end.
Download our free comparison guide here (Microsoft and OpenAI reviewed this guide). Watch a recording of our virtual event on this topic here, and let us know what questions you have for your GenAI Employee Chatbot program.
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Onward,
Paul
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Well done and well said. And seemed like a human touched it!