Paul Leonardi - The Digital Mindset: What It Really Takes to Thrive in the Age of Data, Algorithms, and AI

Today, when every company has to be a tech company, developing a strong digital mindset may be the single most important step toward achieving your future success. The Digital Mindset is an invaluable resource for anyone looking to become a better leader, future-proof their career, or simply gain a better understanding of the present and future of business.

MICKEY (HIROSHI) MIKITANI, founder, Chairman, and CEO, Rakuten Group

If youre worried that algorithms will replace our judgment, big data will make our little knowledge obsolete, or robots will steal our jobs, this book is for you. Paul Leonardi and Tsedal Neeley are leading experts on how technology is transforming work, and they offer the practical insights you need to understand the next wave of digital changeand ride it smoothly.

ADAM GRANT, New York Times bestselling author, Think Again; host, TED podcast WorkLife

Weve all heard it a million times: You need to be more digital. Finally, heres a book that explains what that really means, a book that ascribes real meaning to the buzzword. With clarity and a surprising level of detail, Paul Leonardi and Tsedal Neeley prepare you for the digital future by developing your digital mindset.

SHELLYE ARCHAMBEAU, former CEO, MetricStream; author, Unapologetically Ambitious

Digital transformation doesnt stop with good strategy. It starts there. The Digital Mindset provides critical and actionable insights that make it possible for everyonefrom the executive team to individual contributorsto help their company succeed in the digital era. Todays CEOs must make sure their entire workforce has a digital mindset. This book is the place to start.

JEFF HENLEY, Executive Vice Chairman, Oracle

If we continue to consider the digital age as a purely technological revolution, we will miss the most significant economic, political, and behavioral disruption of our societies since the Industrial Revolution. This is exactly what The Digital Mindset offers: the 360-degree understanding necessary to seize this moment.

ELIE GIRARD, former CEO, Atos

This breakthrough book is the ideal guide to enable you to operate or lead with a digital mindset. Down-to-earth and practical, it makes digital transformation achievable for anyone committed to learning new ways of thinking about the three cs of collaboration, computation, and change in order to solve complex systems problems. Most importantly, you dont need to be a computer guru to transform your organization using these principles.

BILL GEORGE, Senior Fellow, Harvard Business School; former Chairman and CEO, Medtronic; and bestselling author, Discover Your True North

Leonardi and Neeley have produced the indispensable, foundational playbook for leaders looking to thrive in the digital age. In The Digital Mindset they have managed to effectively combine a crisp review of key concepts and practical advice on how to put them to work.

HUBERT JOLY, former Chairman and CEO, Best Buy; Senior Lecturer, Harvard Business School; and author, The Heart of Business

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Leonardi, Paul M., 1979 author. | Neeley, Tsedal, author.

Title: The digital mindset : what it really takes to thrive in the age of data, algorithms, and AI / Paul Leonardi and Tsedal Neeley.

Description: Boston, Massachusetts : Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation, [2022] | Includes index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021047511 (print) | LCCN 2021047512 (ebook) | ISBN 9781647820107 (hardback) | ISBN 9781647820114 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Technological innovations. | Computer literacy. | Numeracy. | Artificial intelligence. | Success in business.

Classification: LCC HD45 .L434 2022 (print) | LCC HD45 (ebook) | DDC 658.5/14dc23/eng/20211202

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021047511

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021047512

ISBN: 978-1-64782-010-7

eISBN: 978-1-64782-011-4

For Rodda, Amelia, Norah, and Eliza, who all have brilliant minds and, most impressively, the courage to change them.

Paul Leonardi

For my mother, the wisest person I know, who embodies curiosity, courage, and lifelong learning.

Tsedal Neeley

The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.

Albert Einstein

Sara Menker sat at her desk in Manhattan staring at her computer screen. It was the summer of 2008 and she was watching the financial markets collapse before her eyes. As an energy commodities trader at Morgan Stanley, she knew the numbers running across her screen were catastrophic. A loud gasp from her colleague at the next desk made her turn. He had his face in his hands, as if to hide from the horror. The worlds coming to an end, he said. This is Armageddon. We better start buying up gold.

What are you going to do with all that gold if the worlds economies collapse? Sara blurted out. Forget gold. Buy a sack of potatoes! You need potatoes. Well all need potatoes.

Her colleague laughed. Then Sara laughed too, uneasily.

Later that evening, Sara was still thinking about potatoes. Born and raised in Ethiopia, a country with a history of catastrophic famine, she understood the value of food security in ways that many of her peers on Wall Street did not. She found herself researching farmland prices in her home country. Thinking like a trader, she saw an investment opportunity. The land was cheap. It was selling for $1.50 an acre in some areas. It also seemed relatively easy to purchase tens of thousands of acres.

Intrigued, Sara decided to take a trip home to learn more. She didnt know anything about agriculture, but she had confidence that she could learn about a new industry quickly. After a few days of firsthand exposure, she was amazed at what she saw. To successfully grow crops, an Ethiopian landowner would have to buy crop insurance. But there was no crop insurance market. If no bank would lend money without the security of crop insurance, then the cost of capital would be much higher. The land was also remote, which meant leveling and road building. To grow potatoes, a farmer would have to essentially build out an entire agricultural infrastructure. That was much too costly and too risky for most peopleincluding Sara. She quickly abandoned her idea of becoming a potato farmer.