Startup founders, tech executives, and venture capitalists are using AI to help them think through strategy and make decisions. AI can ingest and summarize vast amounts of data and work with you to give your strategy an edge. AI is growing and will only continue to do so in the near future. Each of the AI giants is vying for a percentage of market share. OpenAI Accounts for 66.5% of 2.5 M+ Monthly Citations to HackerNoon (HackerNoon). HackerNoon AI can conduct deep research on your behalf on any topic. If you’re not yet using AI as a strategic partner yet ask yourself why? Why Use AI as a Strategic Partner AI has its limitations and isn’t a silver bullet to fix everything or handle everything. Klarna's $40B AI mistep is an example of just that. Klarna's $40B AI mistep Humans need AI and AI needs humans. We should be working together collaboratively. Humans need AI and AI needs humans. We should be working together collaboratively. AI is always available and won’t get tired. It can ingest more data at a faster rate than we humans. AI is a tool we can use to get ahead. Faster, smarter decision-making AI helps you analyze data, weigh tradeoffs, and surface insights fast—so you can make confident decisions without spinning your wheels. Think faster, strategic clarity, fewer “blank page” moments. Bias check and perspective expansion, AI doesn’t carry your blind spots. It can challenge assumptions, offer counterpoints, and simulate diverse perspectives—from investors to skeptical execs. It’s like having a devil’s advocate and a customer whisperer on call. For more on how women’s perspectives and diverse voices are shaping the future of AI, see my insights on the WOMEN x AI blog. WOMEN x AI blog In addition, AI can help identify emerging market trends and alert you to potential risks before they escalate. By continuously monitoring industry news, competitor moves, and regulatory changes, AI can keep your strategy agile and responsive to external shifts. This proactive approach allows founders and executives to pivot quickly and seize new opportunities as they arise. AI can help you scale your thinking and go faster without scaling your team. Increasing your speed is another spot where AI can shine. Instead of waiting on strategy decks, analysis, or rewrites, AI can help you move at founder-speed—turning raw ideas into drafts, frameworks, and insights instantly. It’s not about replacing your team—it’s about augmenting your edge. AI's Five Strategic Roles When collaborating with AI, you can assign it one of these roles to help the AI provide a more helpful output. According to McKinsey, these are the five different strategic roles AI can play. McKinsey Researcher – Summarizes massive data sets, identifies patterns, and uncovers opportunities (e.g., spotting M&A targets).
Interpreter – Translates raw data into actionable insights, like identifying strategic adjacencies or monitoring emerging trends.
Thought Partner – Challenges assumptions, generates new ideas, and helps mitigate bias during strategy design.
Simulator – Models market scenarios, competitor responses, and execution risks to test strategic options before committing.
Communicator – Crafts compelling narratives tailored to stakeholders, ensuring clarity and alignment across an organization. Researcher – Summarizes massive data sets, identifies patterns, and uncovers opportunities (e.g., spotting M&A targets). Interpreter – Translates raw data into actionable insights, like identifying strategic adjacencies or monitoring emerging trends. Thought Partner – Challenges assumptions, generates new ideas, and helps mitigate bias during strategy design. Simulator – Models market scenarios, competitor responses, and execution risks to test strategic options before committing. Communicator – Crafts compelling narratives tailored to stakeholders, ensuring clarity and alignment across an organization. These roles are not mutually exclusive—AI can switch between them as your needs evolve. For example, during a product launch, AI might first act as a Researcher to gather market intelligence, then as a Communicator to help craft investor updates. By clearly defining the role you want AI to play, you can maximize its value at every stage of your strategic process. Strategic AI Prompts My most used strategic AI prompt is “Act as my strategic advisor with 20+ years of experience in [industry]. Review my [strategy], what might I be missing in this plan, and how can I make it stronger?” “Act as my strategic advisor with 20+ years of experience in [industry]. Review my [strategy], what might I be missing in this plan, and how can I make it stronger?” “Act as my strategic advisor with 20+ years of experience in [industry]. Review my [strategy], what might I be missing in this plan, and how can I make it stronger?” During strategic planning sessions, there are two other prompts I often use: “Help me build a 6-month strategic roadmap for launching [product/service] to [audience].”
“Outline key success metrics for [objective], and how to measure them using AI.” “Help me build a 6-month strategic roadmap for launching [product/service] to [audience].” “Help me build a 6-month strategic roadmap for launching [product/service] to [audience].” “Outline key success metrics for [objective], and how to measure them using AI.” “Outline key success metrics for [objective], and how to measure them using AI.” Want more on collaborating on strategy with AI? If you’re looking for a list of my favorite AI strategy prompts, check out my post, on WOMEN x AI: Not Just a Tool—AI Is Your Most Underrated Strategy Partner.” Not Just a Tool—AI Is Your Most Underrated Strategy Partner. Deep Dive With AI’s Deep Research All the big AI models are offering versions of Deep Research. It’s a cornerstone of my approach to partnering with AI on strategy. Deep research is basically AI tools utilizing their large language models (LLMs) with web searches and reasoning capabilities to become your personal research assistant (LifeHacker). LifeHacker To leverage this tool in your strategy discussions, conduct a deep dive on the topic of choice and then upload it to an AI model alongside your strategy prompts. For example, as a marketer, you can ask for a deep dive on SEO in your industry and then pair the output with the insights you receive from. Like traditional AI models, I recommend trying them out and seeing which one fits your use case best. What one is your favorite model today might not be tomorrow. Be sure to retest often as the models change with every update. Tactical Steps to Using AI as a Thought Partner Treat AI like you would your team, ask it questions, and iterate. When you work in partnership, that is where the real AI edge comes in. I suggest starting with a clear prompt and sharing your goal or your why behind the ask. This will help the AI have the proper context, improving the chance that you’ll get a useful output. The output from AI models can be whatever you want. The more specific you are, the easier it will be for you to ingest the data. Try requesting the output format you want: Chart with columns for x,y,z
Bullet points for pros and cons
A 200-word summary
A 1-page executive summary Chart with columns for x,y,z Bullet points for pros and cons A 200-word summary A 1-page executive summary Don’t hesitate to ask follow-up questions or request clarifications from the AI. Treat the interaction as an ongoing conversation rather than a one-off query. This iterative approach helps you refine your thinking, uncover blind spots, and surface creative solutions you might not have considered on your own After a few iterations, when you think you have a good strategy, it’s time for the next step. Ask AI to Pressure-Test Your Thinking: Play devil’s advocate: “What would a skeptical investor say about this pitch?” Play devil’s advocate: Simulate an audience: “How would a first-time founder interpret this advice?” Simulate an audience: Compare paths: “What are the tradeoffs between [thing 1] and [thing 2]?” Compare paths: As always, be sure to fact-check any AI output you plan to use. In AI systems, errors are invisible, plausible, and self-reinforcing (Hackernoon). Hackernoon At the end of the day, we humans should be making the strategy calls, but AI should be a well-used tool in your strategic thinking toolkit. Feature Photo by Cash Macanaya on Unsplash Feature Photo by Cash Macanaya on Unsplash

The is an opinion piece based on the author’s POV and does not necessarily reflect the views of HackerNoon.

Forward-Thinking Leaders Are Using AI as a Strategic Partner

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