The World Will Still Revolve Around People

Team Jefferies,

Clearly there is endless potential in the constantly evolving and breathtaking advances of artificial intelligence.  Many of us, as well as Jefferies overall, are embracing these advances with purpose and excitement, and are already seeing how this technology can make us better at what we do and in how we live.  That said, there is an uncomfortable feeling many are experiencing that knowledge workers will now be replaced by technology that is smarter, faster, more accurate and indefatigable than any of us.  The human condition is imperfect, emotional, sensitive, sometimes fatigued, and often confused.  It hardly seems like a fair fight and only a matter of time before the “Terminators” declare victory over us “mere mortals.”

We disagree.  We asked a cross section of our most knowledgeable teammates from around Jefferies why they believe the human connection will continue to be critically vital to our long-term success.  What can we folks do that artificial intelligence cannot?  We took their responses, added onto them, and incorporated some of our own thoughts and perspectives.  The culmination of our work is the list below of things in which we believe humans will always hold the advantage over machines.  It is certainly possible that technology will be able to add value to some of these concepts over time.  There will also be areas where AI will be superior to humans.  Nobody knows exactly what the future holds, which is why our business and lives are so complex, exciting, and fulfilling.  The bottom line is we have high conviction that the Jefferies world will incorporate AI into almost everything we do, but our world will still revolve around our people.  Below is some food for thought.

People > Machines:

1. Trust & Relationships.  At the core of our work is earning and sustaining client trust through long-term human relationships.  While clients will demand best in class technology, trust is built through empathy, experience, partnership, and shared accountability, especially during moments of uncertainty.  Decision makers want people they believe in to stand with them, to give confidence when acting, resolve when conditions turn, perspective when things go wrong, and judgment when outcomes matter most.  AI can inform decisions, but it cannot replace trust. Human relationships remain the foundation of our business.
2. Culture will always define a business and will be a determining factor of its likelihood of success.  Integrity, long-term orientation versus short-term priorities, motivation, and inspiration to go the extra mile will never be determined by a computer algorithm.  AI will not be able to “set the tone” or create a feeling of accountability or loyalty.  The very best people will always be integral to a company’s success, and AI will not be able to recruit or retain them in a manner that instills ownership, pride, and commitment.
3. Risk.  There is little doubt that AI will exponentially enhance the analysis of the data sets required to best assess risk.  That said, no institution will outsource the ultimate risk decisions to technology.  Human relationships, trust factors in diligence, subtle and soft issues amongst people, and all those heavily nuanced moments of inflection require a human being with experience to best navigate.
4. Human Resources.  AI will be a huge help here, but even the best program will not be able to have a difficult conversation during a performance review, successfully manage a disciplinary action or termination, help during a personal crisis, or maturely resolve a workplace conflict.  
5. Perception & Credibility:  In financial services, outcomes often hinge on credibility: “Do I believe you? Will you stand behind this? Are you aligned with me when things go wrong?”  Humans are better at reading the room, sensing fear, frustration, hesitation, or resolve, and making empathetic, reputational commitments such as “I’ll own this,” which help retain trust through volatility, losses, and operational failures.  AI can surface scenarios and probabilities.  However, owned decisions, where an individual is accountable to clients, boards, regulators, the media, and their own firm, still require human agency.  Credibility is built through judgment, coalition building, and accountability in moments where the stakes are social and emotional as much as analytical.
6. Accountability Through Hard Decisions.  Making accountable decisions in the face of ambiguity where the “right” answer is partly moral, political, or strategic.  A lot of finance is not optimization—it’s choosing between defensible options when data is incomplete and the tradeoffs are values-laden.
7. Negotiation.  Negotiation isn’t always resolved based on just the facts.  In our world, human-to-human bargaining on price, covenants, governance, disclosure, settlement posture, waivers, timing, messaging, are all very complex.  It’s not just logic; it’s reading incentives, spotting hidden constraints, building rapport, using timing, and knowing when someone is posturing versus not.
8. Lobbying/Politics.  Until the machines do away with all of us (in which case worrying about this is moot), human beings will be the ones who get big things done or prevent them from being done.  All of the data in the world will not change this.  In fact, depending upon how AI develops and is integrated into society in the future, perhaps the biggest risk to artificial intelligence is how those in charge of building it deal with the lobbying and political aspect of everything AI is going to affect.  In this case, AI may have as much to worry about people as we do of them.

We do not have all the answers, and the world is changing quickly, even as you read this note.  That said, our message today is that every one of us must embrace this remarkable technological advance with urgency and open arms.  This tool will make all of us better as we strive to best serve our important constituents.  However, none of us should lose track of the big picture.  If we are doing things that are easily replicable and based solely on repetition and data, it is time to embrace the efficiency of a better way to accomplish these tasks and spend the majority of our time doing what humans do best: Build trusting relationships, use independent thought critically based on these relationships and experience, form and share accurate opinions in an imperfect world and help create the vision for where Jefferies needs to be today, and head to in the future.

Revolving around this complicated and everchanging world with all of you,

Rich and Brian