The CEO Mindset: How to Think Like a Founder

I was hosting an AI webinar for my organization, facing a virtual room filled with some of our nation's top minds, experts in their respective ecosystems who were visibly skeptical about AI. These weren't just any professionals; they were established authorities with decades of experience who saw AI as either a passing trend or a potential threat to their carefully cultivated expertise.

Twenty minutes into my presentation, the General Manager, who had been silently observing, unmuted himself and asked a question that shifted the entire atmosphere: "If this were your personal decision, not just a corporate initiative, how much AI implementation would you actually recommend for our organization?"

Time slowed. Sixty faces turned to me in their virtual squares. The question wasn't just about technology adoption, it was testing whether I thought like a cautious employee or a forward-thinking owner.

In the months prior, I had immersed myself in understanding AI's implications beyond the headlines. I researched how it was transforming adjacent industries, studied the strategic moves of leading organizations, and identified how it could address our specific operational pain points.

So rather than giving the politically safe answer about "measured adoption" that would have appeased the skeptical audience, I said: "If it were entirely my decision, I'd accelerate AI implementation across every possible process immediately. The organizations that don't fully embrace AI capabilities will be irrelevant within five years. It's not about replacing our expertise, it's about amplifying it and focusing our human intelligence on problems that actually require it."

The GM nodded thoughtfully while several senior experts visibly bristled.

The next morning, I received an email from the GM asking which AI workshops he should personally take and how he could start practicing with AI while waiting for formal training. And about a month later, I was nominated to join the Ministry of Finance nationwide AI experts network, a prestigious group tasked with breaking through bureaucratic red tape to accelerate AI implementation across the entire public sector.

Later, the GM told me: "Most people in your position would have given a more diplomatic answer. You thought like an owner concerned about our future relevance, not an employee worried about ruffling feathers. That perspective is exactly what we need."

That moment crystallized something I've observed throughout my career: the people who advance fastest don't just do their jobs well—they think like founders even when they're nowhere near the C-suite.