AI Is The New Excel

AI is the new Excel.

Spreadsheets revolutionized how businesses work with data. AI is about to fundamentally change how we work with information, creativity, and knowledge.

Its impact will reach far beyond Excel's domain of calculations and data analysis, touching every aspect of how we work and create. And just like Excel became an essential business skill, AI proficiency will soon be non-negotiable in the professional world.

Excel forever changed how we work with data

In 1985, Microsoft released a piece of software that would fundamentally transform how businesses operate: Excel.

Before its arrival, financial modelling and data analysis were the domain of specialized accountants and analysts using physical ledgers or expensive mainframe computers. The spreadsheet revolution democratized data analysis, putting powerful analytical capabilities into the hands of regular business users.

Excel's power lay in its ability to break down complex problems into manageable chunks – cells and formulas that anyone could understand and manipulate. Suddenly, everyone from small business owners to corporate managers could create budgets, forecast sales, and analyze trends without specialized training. A task that might have taken days to complete by hand could be done in hours or minutes with the right spreadsheet formulas.

The learning curve was significant – users had to master concepts like cell references, formulas, and macros.

But the productivity gains were so substantial that Excel expertise quickly became a standard business skill. Companies that adopted Excel early gained a significant competitive advantage, leading to its near-universal adoption in the business world.

Today, we stand at a similar inflection point with Generative AI.

AI looks a lot like Excel in the early days

Just as Excel democratized data analysis, AI is about to democratize cognitive tasks that were once the exclusive domain of specialists. And there are quite a few similarities:

• Both are productivity multipliers: transforming hours of work into minutes through automation and computation.

• Both break down complex problems into manageable pieces - Excel through cells and formulas, AI through prompts and iterations - making sophisticated tasks accessible to everyone.

• Both serve as interfaces that bridge humans with complex processes: Excel connects us to computational tasks, while AI links us to cognitive ones.

• Both follow similar adoption patterns, starting with a learning curve (formulas for Excel, prompting for AI).

• Both created competitive advantages for early adopters, driving rapid workplace adoption and fundamentally changing how work gets done.

The key difference? While Excel revolutionized specific business functions, AI is transforming virtually every domain of human work and creativity, from writing and design to research and decision-making.

AI will forever change knowledge work

While the Excel parallel is instructive, AI represents a far more profound transformation.

Excel primarily revolutionized quantitative analysis and business operations. AI, on the other hand, is poised to transform nearly every aspect of human work and creativity:

A few reasons why we believe AI's impact will be more far-reaching:

• Its interface is natural language: where Excel required learning a specific interface and formula language, AI can be engaged through natural language. That will make it accessible to everyone.

• It shines with unstructured data: the reality is complex and nuance is needed to approach it. AI’s ability to process unstructured data will make it stand out and outperform traditional software solutions.

• It can transform all knowledge work: Excel automated calculations; AI augments human thinking itself. AI will touch everything from creative writing to scientific research, from customer service to healthcare diagnostics.

AI isn't just another business tool - it's the new way knowledge work will be done. The big question that remains is how fast individuals and companies will adapt to it.

My guess is once we will see the first organizations truly going AI-first and reaping the benefits, the rest will follow very quickly.