When you ask executives whether their organizations use AI, most say yes. When you ask who made the decision, the room goes quiet.
That gap matters. In most organizations, AI arrived without a vote. Someone in marketing started drafting with it. Someone in finance began summarizing reports. Someone in human resources started using it to screen applicants. The adoption already happened. What’s missing is a decision about who is accountable, what data is permitted, and what happens when the output is wrong.
Those are not technical questions. They are leadership questions, and they belong to the people at the top.
This is a Memphis issue as much as a business one. Our region
runs on organizations that people depend on: hospitals, schools, nonprofits, logistics companies, small businesses. When leaders at those organizations adopt AI without a plan, the risk lands on patients, students, clients and employees. When they adopt it well, the benefits reach well beyond a single boardroom.
Memphis has the talent and ambition to lead in this era, but only if our leaders are equipped to do it deliberately.
The good news is that doing it well doesn’t require a technical background. It requires judgment: knowing whether a proposal built with AI will hold up, whether the data behind it is sound, and whether your organization can actually carry it out. That skill doesn’t come from a tutorial. It comes from working through real problems with people who are facing the same ones.
It also requires honesty with staff. The technical side of adoption is usually the easy part. Implementations stall when the people who will use or supervise the new tools were never brought along, and when no one has had the honest conversation about what this means for their work. If you can’t explain to your team what AI means for their jobs, you don’t have an adoption plan. You have a purchase.
So where should a leader start? Not with a platform, which will probably change within the year. Start with one problem: a workflow with a measurable cost, a clear owner, and a failure you can live with while you learn. Then write it down: who is responsible, what success looks like, and by when. A plan with owners and dates beats a pilot every time.
That belief is behind the AI Leadership Institute, which Leadership Memphis and Vista Data will launch in spring 2027. The institute is built around each participant’s own organization. Leaders bring a real problem, test ideas using approved or de-identified information and leave with an opportunity brief, a tested workflow, and a phased adoption plan with an owner and milestones. It is designed for chief executives, presidents, executive directors and senior leaders, and enrollment is limited so the work stays hands-on. Details will be available at www.leadershipmemphis.org.
Whether or not you join us, the question is the same: Who in your organization owns AI? If the answer is no one, that’s the first thing to fix. Memphis has always been strongest when its leaders take responsibility for what comes next, and this is another chance to do that.
Dr. Reginald Porter Jr. is the president and CEO of Leadership Memphis, and Reggie Manning is the CEO and co-founder of Vista Data.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Memphis business leaders can’t outsource the AI decision | Opinion
