One Person With AI Just Outperformed a Two-Person Team

A new Harvard and Wharton study found that one person using AI matched the output of a two-person team without it. The implications go straight to the org chart. Harvard and Wharton researchers just ran an experiment inside Procter and Gamble that should worry anyone still drawing org charts the old way. They randomly assigned 791 P&G professionals to tackle real product innovation challenges. Some worked alone, some in teams, with AI or without. The result: one person using AI produced work equal in quality to a two-person team without it. That's the headline. Here's what should actually keep you up at night. AI erased functional silos between R&D and sales. People who knew almost nothing about product development reached the same level as experienced teams once they had AI in the room. And people working alone with AI reported more motivation and less anxiety than people working in teams without it. I've spent my career helping leaders design high performing organizations. Most of the companies I work with never designed their structure on purpose. It evolved. Departments formed around who happened to hold what knowledge. R&D held expertise sales never had access to. Marketing held customer insight finance never saw. For decades, that division of labor made sense. The P&G study suggests it doesn't anymore. When AI expands what any one person can discover and do, a lot of the coordination machinery built to connect specialists stops earning its keep. A product team can build its own business case without a finance specialist in the room. It can run its own competitive analysis without a dedicated strategist. Most organizations haven't touched their structure to reflect any of this. So here's where I'd start, if I were rebuilding a team today. First, build teams around goals instead of functions. Organize people around a specific customer outcome or business problem, not a job title. Staff the team based on what the goal actually requires, and check you're not duplicating capability AI already covers. Second, staff teams with human judgment. Let AI handle the research, the analysis, the idea generation. Put people where experience actually matters: reading context and making the final call. Third, move functions out of departments and into networks. Stop treating expertise as something that lives inside one team. Let specialists join the goal-based teams that actually need their judgment, when they need it. The org chart that built your advantage for the last decade might be exactly what's holding back the next one. That's the reframe so you can leapfrog the headlines, your leadership, and your business. Subscribe so you don't miss the next one, and find me at sorenkaplan.com. Show Notes Subscribe and listen on: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLU3e5k8HJeOGEa7AGA97kvVjtpi6uqG0t Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/033iseLQje3RnPGqUlh2I8?si=cb19276a3c68459d Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/leapfrogging-the-headlines-with-soren-kaplan/id1896880297 View original on Inc. Magazine: https://www.inc.com/soren-kaplan/your-org-chart-was-built-for-a-different-era-research-shows-3-ways-leaders-should-redesign-it/91402218