WSJ Tech News Briefing · Wednesday, September 9, 2026
Dan Swan, a senior partner at McKinsey, discussed the importance of human capabilities in leveraging AI tools. He emphasized that the focus is shifting from pure analysis to skills like prompting AI for the right outcomes. Swan believes that aligning an organization's operating model and employee capabilities with AI technology is crucial for sustained impact.
“One of the biggest unlocks we see is the human being capabilities around the technology.”
“Whereas before you may need to be really good at analysis, now the skill might be, how do you prompt these tools to get the right answers and outcomes.”
“And so for us, it's a really big priority to help companies to understand how do you need to change the operating model of your organization and change the underlying capabilities and the people that are interacting with the technology.”