AI promises rewards but also comes with risks ― namely, that competitors figure out how to successfully use it before you do. This year’s 2019 MIT SMR-BCG Artificial Intelligence Global Executive Study and Research Report shows early AI winners are focused on organization-wide alignment, investment, and integration.

This week’s must-reads for managing in a digital age: What the U.S. is getting wrong about the race for powerful AI, why putting culture front and center when managing is important, Facebook faces cryptocurrency hurdles, and why sports analytics fail in the playoffs.

On Oct. 8-10, MIT SMR is dropping its paywall — all of the content is freely available to visitors. Readers will have immediate access to ideas, research, benchmarks and tools, all grounded in the reality of our technologically driven economy and society. We’re offering some recommendations based on what readers tell us are some of the most pressing problems they’re facing right now.

This week’s must-reads for managing in a digital age: How not to frame a public offering, when humans don’t trust robots, the dark side of agile, and the most important skill an effective leader can have.

Companies are beginning to experiment with AI-driven tools to better coordinate the workflows in different business silos. The result: More effective integration of efforts among business units and between business partners.

This week’s must-reads for managing in a digital age: The right way to regulate big tech, how 5G will change the nature of work, and a new podcast for busy leaders.

There’s very little regulatory oversight for the tech industry, and this has become a problem. The status quo lacks transparency and shuts down competition — while holding no one accountable for breaches of trust. Some want big tech companies broken up. Others want stronger government oversight. They all are trying to answer the same question: What’s the best way to regulate the tech industry so that privacy and ethics concerns are addressed without stifling innovation?

In the past half-decade, we’ve undergone a sea change in our thinking about the future. Whether it’s our feelings about our rapidly deteriorating planetary environment or the equally disconcerting rapidity of technological advances, the general sentiment is one of heightened anxiety — and powerlessness. Is there anything we can do? The short answer: Yes.

As organizations begin adopting deep learning, leadership must ensure that artificial neural networks are accurate and precise to avoid negative impacts on business decisions that hurt customers, products, and services. A designed-centered approach helps address both these short-term concerns as well as the long-term concerns that machines might displace humans when it comes to business decision-making.

This week’s must-reads for managing in a digital age: How to sabotage your company, AI passes eighth grade and what that means for businesses, and give your customers what they want — sometimes.

Automation can go far beyond cars. Self-driving company capabilities are closer than many leaders realize. And just as automobile manufacturers are rethinking the meaning of driving within the context of self-driving technology, business leaders are being forced to rethink an equivalent question: What does it mean to manage an enterprise once some of the work can be done autonomously?

Despite companies’ efforts to invest in leadership development, studies show that managerial skills gaps are increasingly common. The downstream effects of these gaps negatively affect not only businesses but extend to the global economy as well. To address this critical problem, leaders must place increased focus on their own development as managers in order to facilitate an increase in productivity across the board.

What are the biggest challenges to AI implementation? MIT SMR readers share their thoughts in a recent online discussion.

The must-reads MIT SMR editors are reading this week, including: potential pitfalls of the agile workspace, influencers’ influence on marketing, and gender bias in unlikely places.

The must-reads MIT SMR editors are reading this week, including: How working couples are hacking inequality at home, the future of work won’t be utopian, and why you should kill your favorite meeting.

The combined power of social, mobile, analytics, and cloud technologies has now become part of the technology foundation for organizations. In the looming “post-digital” era, adopting these technologies isn’t going to offer a competitive advantage — it will be a necessity for doing business.

The must-reads MIT SMR editors are most excited about this week, including: Why emotion is a key ingredient for getting customer experiences to stick, what we can learn from Germany’s platform economy, the best leader for your digital transformation effort might not be the obvious candidate, and more.

How should organizations organize for and implement artificial intelligence?

A key driver of AI’s role in the global economy will be how cities deal with technological developments. Many cities plan to become “smart cities” armed with AI-driven processes, like AI-based traffic control systems. But simply adopting these new technologies won’t be enough to guarantee their success. Like organizations and education experts, cities need to assess and prepare for AI-related skills gaps.