OUR BEST IDEAS FOR THE C-SUITE

Welcome to the latest edition of The CEO Shortlist, a biweekly newsletter of our best ideas for the C-suite. In this issue, we dig into two critical uses of agentic AI: software development and business building. We appreciate the opportunity to connect and hope you find our perspectives useful and thought provoking. You can reach us at Alex_Panas@McKinsey.com and Becca_Coggins@McKinsey.com. Thank you, as ever.

—Alex and Becca

Agentic AI’s killer app. Software development is happening differently these days. Across industries, roles are being redistributed: AI agents work the night shift to run complex tasks and workflows; humans spend their days setting high-level intent and boundaries, evaluating outputs, and reacting to agentic decisions and suggestions. The resulting agentic factory features smaller teams, much lower unit costs, and much faster idea-to-impact cycle times. Leading companies are well on their way to 20-fold productivity gains. This chapter excerpt from McKinsey’s latest book, Rewired: How Leading Companies Win with Technology and AI, explains this step change in programming and what it means for leaders. 

Chat, build me a business. Predictions of a new unicorn built by a single person and AI have come true. Innovative companies are also in the mix, as AI becomes the new operating system of venture building. Just as personal computers transformed knowledge work and the internet reshaped commerce and communication, AI is challenging the assumptions that have governed business building for decades. Our new research shows how the constraints that once defined business creation—team size, capital requirements, and time to market—may need to be reconsidered. 

We hope you find these insights helpful. See you in a couple of weeks with more McKinsey ideas for the CEO and others in the C-suite.

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