The "agentic organization" isn't new. I ran a version of it in 1998 — a trainyard where humans governed the tracks. The trains are AI agents now. What hasn't changed is who has to be in the tower. And the danger was never the trains.
In January 2025 I asked whether any AI could tell me what time of day orders come in. One did — right after I told it order timing was the variable. That one-second gap, between answering a question and knowing which question to ask, is why adding an AI agent to an undiagnosed field doesn't build an intelligent ecosystem. It builds a faster version of the existing misalignment. Gemba walks one floor. The agent field has no floor.
These maps don’t contradict each other. They reveal what’s missing.
Why does the ProcureTech solution side of the table make billions, while the practitioner side loses trillions (and more)?
The Agentic Organization Isn’t New. It’s a Bigger Trainyard — and the Real Risk Is an Empty Tower.
July 24, 2026
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The "agentic organization" isn't new. I ran a version of it in 1998 — a trainyard where humans governed the tracks. The trains are AI agents now. What hasn't changed is who has to be in the tower. And the danger was never the trains.