There is a scene in The Matrix that has been stuck with me since 1999. Neo sits in a chair while training programs are uploaded directly into his brain. Hours of martial arts knowledge transferred in minutes. When it’s over, he opens his eyes and delivers one of the most memorable lines in science fiction history: “I know kung fu.” It is an incredible moment. It’s also not the important part.
A few minutes later, Morpheus takes Neo into a sparring program and proceeds to beat him up. Neo knows all the moves. He has access to all the techniques. Yet he still struggles because knowing every possible move is not the same thing as knowing which move this situation requires. That’s the difference between knowledge and skill, and it’s exactly where many organizations find themselves with AI today.
Most people think AI’s value comes from what it knows. That’s understandable. These systems have access to more information than any employee, consultant, or executive could consume in a lifetime. But if you’ve used AI for any serious work, you’ve probably noticed something. The first draft is often pretty good, but it still isn’t quite right. The tone is off. The format isn’t what your organization expects. It missed something important. So you correct it. Then you correct it again. Eventually you get what you wanted.
Then tomorrow you teach it the same lesson all over again.
At some point you realize the real problem isn’t intelligence. The problem is that your organization’s expertise lives inside people’s heads. Every company has unwritten rules about how reports are written, how customers are handled, how decisions are communicated, and what good work looks like. Experienced employees know these things instinctively. New employees learn them over time. AI knows none of them unless someone takes the time to teach it.
That’s what a skill really is. It isn’t programming. It isn’t training a model. It’s simply writing down how your organization wants a certain kind of work performed. Think of it as creating a playbook for AI the same way you’d create a playbook for a new employee. What does good look like? What should never happen? What matters most? When that knowledge is documented, AI can stop starting from scratch and begin working more like a member of your team.
This is why I believe skills are one of the most important concepts in enterprise AI. Your competitors can buy the same tools you can. They can access the same models and the same technology. What they cannot buy is your organization’s accumulated experience. That’s the real opportunity. Not teaching AI more facts. Teaching it how your business thinks. Because knowing kung fu is impressive. Teaching your organization how to remember is where the advantage begins.
Scott Hagberg is Chief Technology Officer at United Capital Financial Advisors, Technology Advisor at Creative Planning, and Founder and Principal Consultant at ONS Consulting Group.
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