Leaders are using AI as an excuse for outdated decision-making

If you read the news around the latest rounds of Big Tech layoffs, they’re being treated as an unavoidable consequence of ‘AI transformation’. One that’s shrinking teams and reorganising departments. But artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t forcing leaders to make these decisions, and when they blame the technology, what they’re really admitting is their inability to adapt fast enough.

These job cuts aren’t bold reinvention. They’re a familiar reflex. Cutting people is easy; redesigning work with the right tech systems underneath is hard. Yet it’s the latter that drives long-term performance.

The ‘AI made us do it’ myth

The idea that AI is pushing leaders into layoffs has quickly become one of the most persistent myths of today. While AI is undeniably reshaping work, it hasn’t demanded mass job cuts. Companies are using the narrative as a cover for decisions they already planned to make, or to cover up poor business adaptability in the new AI-led work environment.

AI isn’t the problem. Many organisations are struggling with something far more fundamental: disconnection – between leaders and teams, data and decisions, and insight and action. And the real irony is that AI’s true power isn’t automation but alignment.

When used well, AI joins the dots between people, performance and outcomes. It can be the engine of what I call a modern ‘System of Productivity’: a way of working where people, data, and decisions flow together rather than in silos.

Too many organisations never reach this point. They introduce new tools, build more dashboards, and collect more data – yet still lack the right systems to make it meaningful. In that environment, headcount reduction gets mistaken for efficiency. Companies shrinking in the name of AI aren’t becoming more intelligent, they’re becoming more fragile.

Integration over isolation