There's a lot of noise right now about what AI will change. I keep coming back to a Jeff Bezos quote from 2019 that asks a completely different question.
He says, “I get asked constantly what will change in the next 10 years, but I almost never get asked what won't.” He thinks the second question is actually the more important one, because you can build a strategy around the things that are stable in time.
I think he's right, and I find it a more useful frame right now than most of what I'm hearing. A lot of the conversation is oriented around AI strategy: what's the moat, which layer wins, what's the play. In my view, that's putting the cart before the horse. I'll occasionally catch myself wondering if I'm just the horse-and-buggy guy (maybe I am), but I'm going to bet that at least 2 things will stay the same:
- Brilliant, determined founders who are genuine industry outsiders will keep creating disruptive startups
- Culture will keep eating strategy for breakfast
I think it remains true regardless of what AI does to everything else, because the underlying logic hasn't changed: the best companies in any era were built by brilliant people using the best tools available to them.
When engineers at Intel and Fairchild Semiconductor were building the first microprocessors, they weren't chiseling with rocks. They were using the most sophisticated equipment they could get their hands on. Great people have always done that, and I don't think that changes either.
So if you've attracted the Michael Jordans, the Phil Jacksons, the Scottie Pippens, and Michael Jordan wants to work on token maxing (pushing AI to its limits on every task), well, that's your strategy signal. The strategy follows the people, not the other way around.
I don't think it's going to be about runaway AIs with everyone sitting on the sidelines. I'm still looking for the founders who prove that right.
What won't change in your work over the next 10 years? That's where I'm putting my energy.
Video