UNLESS you’ve been living in a fridge for the last couple of years, the relentless march of AI - combined with the stream of hyperbole surrounding it - is making heads turn in the digital workplace. From simplifying complex information to authoring entire reports, we’re seeing the impact of AI affect almost every aspect of work.

Innovation and creativity have been very specific use cases for AI to assist, and even replace people. With demonstrated outcomes that augment the creativity of people, helping us to generate and improve ideas using generative AI for innovation and creative thinking is a rapidly developing space. And though, at present, ideas generated wholly from AI tools tend to be unreliable, often hallucinatory, or not particularly original, there’s no doubt that they will improve.

As a one-time innovation manager and now digital collaboration specialist, I’ve been working for the last 15 years or so in the space where people and tech combine. Looking for how we can leverage workplace technology to meet our goals and aims rather than having the tools dictate how we work. And AI is threatening to change all of this – to tell us what we need to be working on today, who we need to meet, how we should communicate.

And here’s the big issue for AI and innovation: it likes to tell us what to do. It’s authoritative and pretty knowledgeable – yet are these the traits that drive innovation in people?

A good innovation team certainly needs to be knowledgeable. Yet, I’d say that’s low on the list of priorities.  Innovation and creativity – especially within the confines of everyday working – stem from curiosity.

Let’s also consider good leadership traits. Are good leaders the ones who tell us what to do, or are they the ones who listen? Micromanagement gets the tasks done, it doesn’t develop us or encourage creative thinking.

Leaders who listen, who ask questions are the ones who foster more collaborative and innovative teams. In fact, Korn Ferry identified the key leadership traits for the future as inquisitiveness, agility, humility, and an insatiable appetite for learning.

Yet presently, we’re obsessed with efficiency. Of moving tasks forward as fast as possible. And this is also AI’s best fit as we begin to develop its role in the workplace – of helping to move tasks along by surfacing what we need, by reminding us of tasks we’ve missed, by summarising deep technical information and cutting out the things deemed superfluous.

All very noble, and certainly important in our task and time-focused working culture. But there’s far more to productivity than efficiently ticking things off. Innovation and creativity stem from knowing the bigger picture.

And this is where generative AI tools are very limited. As they rely on already existing content, they are there to imitate rather than innovate.

Genuine creativity can arrive from a variety of sources and inspiration, however, curiosity through asking questions and digging a little deeper is the true secret sauce to improve how we work and what we do. Of asking questions of both people and the technology.

That’s not to say that we can’t use Generative AI for innovation. It’s there to help us – and that’s how we need to treat it. Rather than relying on to do all the innovation for us, we need to ask it questions. We need to use our curiosity to drive creativity.  For example, AI is brilliant at recognising patterns – but what data, and why? AI is also powerful in analysing content that could otherwise take us days or even weeks.

Again, we know to know which data we need to look at, and why we need to.

Which is why us mere mortals need to keep asking questions – of each other and of our AI tools. We need to be clear on why we are doing something, on what is happening beyond our day-to-day work, on what else is being done. Rather than an AI dictator, we need an AI doer.

Think of it as the kind of personality who loves detail, who can sift through complex information finding hidden nuggets. Good news for the remaining humans among us.

 By Andrew Pope. Andrew is Director at Modern Work Consultant. He’s helped UK and Australian government departments and global organisations design hybrid and digital working strategies and has coached teams in essential skills in Microsoft 365 to thrive in today's workplace.  Send article feedback to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.