The Insightful Leader

The Insightful Leader brings you another episode of "Life, Automated"—a podcast from Kellogg's Ryan Institute on Complexity.

Kellogg Professor Sébastien Martin speaks with host Jess Love about AI's pedagogical potential. In his own operations management class, students trade PDFs for lifelike chatbots, log conversations with Socratic AI tutors, and use AI to explore the kinds of social and political dynamics that students normally have to learn on the job.

But Martin also grapples with harder questions: What about public schools with fewer resources? When should kids use AI at all? And how can students stay hopeful and true to their own interests in a wildly uncertain future?

(This is part 1/2 of Life, Automated's back-to-school series)

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This week on The Insightful Leader, we're bringing you an episode of "Life, Automated"—a new podcast from Kellogg's Ryan Institute on Complexity.

Join host Jess Love as she attempts to answer the question on everyone's lips: Will AI actually take over every job ever?

Kellogg economist Ben Jones doesn't think so.

Drawing from historical evidence around innovation, Jones argues that automation never conquers everything—it inevitably creates operational bottlenecks that only humans can solve. By leaning into these bottlenecks, we can protect meaningful, well-paid work.

But his optimism comes with a stark caveat: there is one nightmare scenario where this historical pattern breaks down entirely. And it doesn't involve superintelligence. It involves mediocre AI.

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In the fifth—and final—episode of "Insight Unpacked: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?" we consider how AI and the human spirit could get us to net zero.

America passed its biggest-ever climate bill … only to reverse course three years later. In the fourth episode of "Insight Unpacked: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?" experts discuss why policy solutions struggle to stick.

A few years ago, the stock market was wild about green tech and ESG funds. And then it wasn't. We look at why in the third episode of "Insight Unpacked: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?"

They say they want to do better. In the second episode of "Insight Unpacked: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?" we look at an oil company, a tech giant, and an Italian energy provider to explore why net-zero pledges have barely moved the needle.

Saving the planet is going to take more than net-zero pledges and shopping green. In the first episode of our series, "Insight Unpacked: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?" we take the current temperature of the climate fight.

Introducing Insight Unpacked, Season 3: Can We Still Build a Green Economy?

In the last decade, we've seen powerful people and organizations take on the issue of climate change — making big pledges to reduce their carbon emissions by adapting their fleets, retrofitting their offices, or going paperless.

And yet global emissions are still at or near record highs. So what gives?

In this five-episode season, we're asking: If climate change is already reshaping our environment, is there anything that companies, investors, policymakers, technologists, and ordinary people can do to turn things around? And are we even capable of doing that?

There's reason for hope. But our work is certainly cut out for us.

The AI models informing many of our decisions are riddled with preconceptions. On this episode of The Insightful Leader, two experts outline how bias creeps in.

So you've tinkered with AI, but now you want to level up. Here are tips from Kellogg faculty on using the tech more effectively.

Uncertainty is everywhere. On this episode of The Insightful Leader, we examine the effect of geopolitics on everything from Barbies to Sharpies.

Millions of blooms. Two continents, One day. And a very busy airport. On this (rerun) episode, we hear how our favorite symbol of love gets from point A to point B.

On this episode of The Insightful Leader, learn why companies should embrace the social-media testimonial, warts and all.

As your career progresses, it can be easy to get stuck in a narrow professional lane. Learn how to break free on this episode of The Insightful Leader.

From ketchup on hot dogs to politics, it can be hard to talk constructively about polarizing issues. On this episode of The Insightful Leader, we play a game to recognize the traps we often fall into and learn how to avoid them.

It's not just about salary. On this episode of The Insightful Leader's "Ask Insight," we hear how to approach some common work tensions by finding common ground.

There's no "correct" approach to laying people off, but on this episode of The Insightful Leader, we discuss how you can maintain your integrity through the process.

On this episode of The Insightful Leader, an executive coach offers three tales of leaders who let complacency get in the way of success.

When Kellogg's Craig Wortmann lost a portion of his leg to cancer, he felt like he lost part of his identity, too. On this episode of The Insightful Leader podcast, he offers a guide to "bouncing back better."

In this bonus episode of our series, "Insight Unpacked: American Healthcare and Its Web of Misaligned Incentives," a healthcare economist must make critical decisions with partial information.

Also: Do you have advice on how to be a good healthcare consumer? Any lessons you learned the hard way? Professor David Dranove wants to hear from you. Send him an email at d-dranove@kellogg.northwestern.edu, and write "shopping for healthcare" in the subject line.