How Do Workers Develop Good Judgment in the AI Era?

hbr.org · 191 words · saved by 1 readers

AI is creating a major organizational challenge: People with deep experience get huge productivity gains, while junior employees often can’t tell whether AI‑generated work is any good or how to improve it. Because AI now handles the messy, repetitive tasks that once built judgment, junior employees miss chances to develop it. Organizations risk ending up with managers who’ve never done the underlying work and thin leadership pipelines. The solution isn’t just keeping humans in the loop, but redesigning work to build judgment deliberately: clarifying who makes decisions, exposing people to consequences, restoring stretch experiences, and using tools like simulations, case-based learning, and gradual increases in responsibility.

Developing employees How Do Workers Develop Good Judgment in the AI Era? by David S. Duncan February 3, 2026 Illustration by Julie Guillem Post Post Share Save Get PDF Buy Copies Print Summary . AI is creating a major organizational challenge: People with deep experience get huge productivity gains, while junior employees often can’t tell whether AI‑generated work is any good ... more Leer en español Ler em português Post Post Share Save Get PDF Buy Copies Print A few years ago, when I first started experimenting with generative AI as a partner at a consulting firm, I noticed something that su

How Do Workers Develop Good Judgment in the AI Era?

related reading