AI tools may push companies toward a new model: Employees acting like managers of tiny internal ventures, each responsible for metrics they can directly influence, supported by AI instead of large teams.

Scott Belsky’s latest Implications newsletter got me thinking about something I experienced firsthand. He argues organizations will emerge from this period smaller, denser with talent, and less hierarchical. Employees will own outcomes directly, often leveraging AI to execute work that once required entire teams.

I recognize that model immediately. It is the same one corporate innovation groups have chased for decades while trying to establish internal venture teams.

I ran a corporate venture inside a Fortune 500 for four years, from initial concept until it was folded into another group. I assumed that demonstrating that range of capability and vision would open endless doors for my career. Frankly, it hasn’t yet. But I think Belsky is right that AI is creating intense pressure to build fast, smaller, autonomous teams.

The few leaders who can be humble enough to set aside their hunger for power and control, and instead hire leaders with broad and deep experience who can act entrepreneurially, autonomously, and with strong opinions, will have an immense competitive advantage in scaling revenue.

The question is whether large organizations will actually empower those people.

Here’s a PDF for posterity: