I think a lot about the mindset of executive, but also the middle tiers of leadership at enterprises. This is one of the reasons I went to work at Bloomberg for the year that I did. Not that I wanted a career at that enterprise, but I wanted to understand the mindset enterprise leadership has when it comes to API integration inside and outside the enterprise firewall. I am perpetually fascinated by the technology, business, and politics of what happens at this level, and how you tell stories that will matter to this mindset.
I found myself in a discussion about Moltbook, and was asked what enterprise leadership can learn from this. I crafted my response, which included a reference to Doge, and their ability to pull of data heists across government agencies. Despite referencing a congressional report on Doge activities, and citing first-hand conversation I am having with enterprise leadership in government agencies who were impacted by these decisions—I was told this was too political and not relevant to the wider AI discussion going on.
This engagement reveals to me more about how the business and politics stories can be the thing that convinces enterprise leadership to open the doors to artificial intelligence. In that your politics leave you to believe what Elon Musk, Doge, and Trump are saying about government efficiencies, which causes you to lower your guard when it coms to defending your own enterprise value, resources, and work force. Government agencies are just enterprises, and I talk with leadership in these enterprises, just like I do in the private sector. For me they are the same beast, just with different customers.
I like how people can tell me they aren’t related. These are the stories I look for out in the space to understand the mindset of enterprise leadership. Leadership in the C-suite changes regularly, and when this music begins everyone has to move accordingly, and when the music stops everyone has to do the best they can with what they have. Leadership within enterprises who have been there for 10, 15, or 25+ years believe this to be normal. It is just the way things are. They are so accustomed to this reality, it is me who is abnormal and not thinking normally, and understanding the way things are.
So when I point out a trojan horse being invited in by the c-suite in a government enterprise, they don’t see it at all in the same category as them letting a trojan horse into their enterprise. The dissonance between sectors and industries is so fascinating. 90% of the people I talk to in enterprises feel their problems are unique. Nobody is at the scale they are. Nobody has the unique intellectual property that they have. 90% of the people I talk to can’t see the impact the internal musical chairs, as well as the external hype cycles are having on their operations. They are just doing the best they can with what they have, and the perspective they have carved out from their defensive vantage point.
Within this mindset there are no solutions. There are no fixes. There are just stories. The stories that matter today, this week, and this quarter. Few are looking beyond a quarter, except for a general fear of their retirement, losing their job, or the potential of getting a new job where the grass is greener. Within this mindset I am just looking for stories. The macro-level stories that will matter to these folks. The micro-level stories that will matter to the people they manage. But I am also looking for the the thin threads that connect the macro and micro levels, because this is where the veins of truth exist which will bring home the stories that I tell and make them relevant on the ground and on the top floors.
