The Human Side of AI | Part 1: Spinning or Hiding. The Two AI Reactions We See Everywhere.
The most honest question about AI right now is not technical.
It is human.
Is your head spinning, or is it in the sand?
Almost every leadership team we speak to falls into one of these two camps. Sometimes both, depending on the week. Neither is a strategy. Both feel understandable. Both quietly cost you ground.
The spinning companies are easy to spot. There is a new tool every week. A demo every other day. Slack threads full of links. Long conversations that end with “we should test this”. Very little that actually changes how the business runs.
AI becomes motion without meaning.
Layered on top of that noise come the doom narratives. Jobs disappearing. Whole teams replaced. Entire industries rewritten overnight. Some of this is real. Most of it is distorted. The problem is not the headlines themselves. It is that leaders do not know which ones to take seriously and which ones to ignore. That confusion is now a competitive disadvantage.
Spinning feels active. It feels responsible. It feels like you are keeping up. In reality, it often fragments attention and delays the harder decisions. Which problems actually matter. Where the value really sits. What should stop as well as what should start.
Then there is the other reaction.
Hiding.
These teams are quieter. AI is acknowledged, vaguely. It is on the list. It will be dealt with later. After this quarter. After the next hire. After things calm down.
They believe time is still on their side.
It usually is not.
AI is not a trend you can wait out. It is a shift in how operational decisions get made and how quickly companies can move once they have clarity. The advantage does not come from being first to adopt a tool. It comes from being early enough to shape how work gets done before habits harden and competitors pull ahead.
Waiting feels safe because it avoids the noise. It avoids the risk of choosing the wrong thing. It avoids looking foolish. But avoidance has a cost. It leaves teams reacting instead of leading. It leaves decisions stacked up behind a small number of people. It leaves opportunity unclaimed.
What links both spinning and hiding is not a lack of intelligence. It is a lack of calm leadership.
AI rewards structured thinking. It amplifies whatever is already there. If your decision making is messy, AI accelerates the mess. If ownership is unclear, AI spreads the confusion faster. If your data is fragmented, AI simply reflects that back to you at scale.
This is why so many AI initiatives disappoint. Not because the technology failed, but because the human system around it was not ready.
AI is not a tools problem
The uncomfortable truth is that AI is not primarily a technology problem. It is a leadership one.
The companies that make progress are not the ones chasing every shiny tool or ignoring the whole thing. They are the ones that pause long enough to ask better questions. Where does this genuinely help us move faster. Where does it reduce risk. Where does it free time or improve decisions. And just as importantly, what can wait.
This is where a Fractional Chief AI Officer earns their keep.
Not as a tool pusher. Not as a futurist. But as a calm presence in the room who can separate signal from noise. Someone who understands both the business and the technology well enough to say no most of the time. Someone who can translate hype into practical next steps.
What does a Fractional CAIO do?
A good CAIO does not arrive with a long list of software. They arrive with clarity. They help teams identify which problems are worth solving now, which experiments are worth running, and which ideas should be dropped entirely. They help leaders understand which threats are real and which headlines can safely be ignored.
Most importantly, they restore a sense of direction.
Because the real risk with AI is not falling behind on tools. It is losing confidence in your own decision making. It is letting fear or distraction drive strategy. It is mistaking activity for progress.
Behind every successful AI shift sits a human making clear decisions. Calmly. Repeatedly. With perspective.
What comes next?
In the next part of this series, we will look at why AI initiatives fail even when intentions are good. Not because of bad tools, but because the foundations underneath are not ready.
For now, the starting point is simple.
If your team is spinning, slow down.
If your team is hiding, start small.
And if you are unsure which one you are, that is usually the sign you need clarity most.
