AI combined with Anthro Intelligence enhances decision-making at strategic, tactical and operational levels
UPDATED – 12:52 AM, THURSDAY – DECEMBER 22 22

Representative images.
by B Sambamurthy
The world we live in has never experienced such disruptive upheaval and change, for better or for worse. It is not technology that stands between good and bad, success and failure. But this is the social and cultural dimension of technology. Artificial intelligence (AI) has demonstrated technological feasibility in terms of efficiency, speed, convenience, productivity, and more.
But technologies, including artificial intelligence, will lead to policy and business failure if they are seen as irrelevant to human behaviour, socioeconomic and cultural structures, i.e. anthropological intelligence (the multifaceted study of humans).
Despite the deployment of the best technologies such as artificial intelligence, we have seen economic forecasts fail, political polls fail, financial models struggle, technological innovations suffer, consumer surveys mislead, and more. Many attribute these setbacks to the tunnel vision thrown by technology, ignoring the reality on the ground (human intelligence). Let’s look at some great successes and failures.
The Long and Short of Artificial Intelligence
Longer than artificial intelligence (data science and ML), shorter than anthropological intelligence:
Powerful tech mobile companies like Nokia and Blackberry have lost ground, not because of their tech tools, but because of their Anthro Vision, a scientific study of people’s attitudes toward adopting screen-based and virtual keyboard cultures. is catastrophically wrong.
The global financial crisis (2008) shattered the financial system and plunged several countries into prolonged recession, another colossal failure of economic and financial modeling. These powerful institutions with highly sophisticated and scientific risk management systems cannot see under their noses, and they blame some people of color for their plight. Technology fails to capture human frailties like greed and fear.
Despite massive and diverse data and a powerful computational factory, macroeconomic models for predicting and understanding the nature and level of inflation have failed miserably. Most of the world’s central banks thought the threat of inflation was temporary, but it proved sticky and high, pushing millions into poverty and marginalization. Even many Nobel laureates got it wrong. Millions of middle and disadvantaged must pay the price for these failures.
So are policies aimed at mitigating Covid-19, which has disrupted lives and economies across the globe. Many world-renowned scientists have stipulated that a 21-day lockdown would break the cycle of contagion. The scientific model went horribly wrong.
All of these failures have one thing in common, that is, over-reliance on big data and scientific models, while ignoring the response of human behavior (human intelligence) to new opportunities and challenges. Sciences—whether data, management, health, or technology—are not integrated with the cultures of the populations they are supposed to serve. There is no substitute for observing and engaging with people in their local sociocultural, political and economic context.
The idea is not to belittle famous scientists, economists, and technologists, but to highlight the fact that the tools they use may not be wrong but incomplete. What makes models and tools complete? This is human intelligence. I would call this AI lagging other AI (artificial intelligence).
human driven success
The enormous success of tech giants such as Facebook (Meta), Google, Amazon, Apple, Flipkart, WhatsApp, Instagram and other social media and e-commerce platforms owes much to the fusion of scientific and cultural backgrounds. These successes demonstrate that technology is not only an autonomous technological object, but also a complex social system. Anthropology helps redesign and reshape technological systems to become sociotechnical systems that serve people well. The research of academicians such as Professor Brian and many other scholars has fully proved this point.
listen to social silence
Listening and reading in noise is relatively easy, but special skills are required to listen to silence, let alone social silence. To the eyes and ears of human intelligence the silence is deafening. For example, the silence in a house full of children during the holidays, the silence in a stadium full of raucous spectators, the silence in the community about various social, economic, financial, political, etc. inquiries cannot be explained as nothing. They may draw powerful insights from silence. The ability and skill to listen to the silence in surveys and polls is critical to success.
decision making
Human intelligence, or lack thereof, can make the difference between success and failure. When it comes to anthropology, skeletons, skulls and skeletons, etc., comes to mind immediately. But here it is about the study of humans in cultural, social, economic contexts and their relevance to decision making. Human well-being, needs, experience and sustainability are key to success in business or public policy.
Gillian Tett details “how anthropology explains business and life” in her award-winning book “Anthro Vision”. She sees anthropology as an intellectual framework that enables policy makers to see around corners and discover what is hidden in plain sight. The framework, combined with scientific insights, helps business and society address challenges.
She articulates three core principles of anthropological thinking. First, in this age of global contagion, we need to cultivate empathy for strangers and diversity of values. This contagion is not limited to the spread of disease, but involves trade, finance, travel, communication, and social attitudes, for better or for worse. Many central banks complain of monetary policy contagion from developed countries to emerging economies. Our understanding of others and ourselves has not kept pace with being highly interconnected.
The second principle is to listen to other people’s perspectives, no matter how odd. It also makes it easier for people to see themselves. This helps to make the strange familiar and the familiar strange. Third, see the blind spots of others and yourself.
Anthro Intelligence does not replace big data analytics, but rather complements “thick data” (quality) and provides micro-connectivity. (Clifford Geertz).
cultural officer
To tap and leverage Anthro Intelligence, some companies, especially large technology companies, have hired Chief Culture Officers. Human experts report to top management. Whether it is product launch or use case applicability, Anthro plays an important role.
Anthro Intelligence, although not explicitly stated, has played a key role in the success of UPI and the Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AePS). This is an essential part of Digital India.
Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey said that if “he could reinvent social media, he would start by hiring social scientists and computer scientists. This could make our 21st century digital landscape very different and better”.
AI combined with Anthro Intelligence can enhance decision-making at the strategic, tactical and operational levels. Therefore, it should be on the board’s agenda. Whether it’s finance, economics, business, technology, healthcare, or decision-making, AI will deliver exponential, high-impact, and long-lasting results.
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