I came across a LinkedIn post the other day that described “hypegineering,” which the poster explained refers to the moment when AI “marketing becomes more innovative than the technology itself.”
That post came from Ralph Aboujaoude Diaz, the global head of GRC for British consumer services company Haleon. Until last year, Diaz worked in operations cybersecurity for consumer goods giant Philip Morris.
In his post, Diaz added that “side effects may include believing mediocre tech is revolutionary, confusing hype with progress, buying solutions to problems you don’t have and defending it like your job depends on it.”
As amusing as that might seem, the problem is frighteningly real. The sad truth is that enterprise IT executives are partly — perhaps mostly — to blame for the current hype around AI.
For many decades, senior IT leaders (pre-dating when it was called MIS) were the technology hype-deflators with razor-shape BS detection skills. That level of skepticism was needed. Tech vendors have always exaggerated and left out critical context when they weren’t outright lying about their products.
