Going into her freshman year at Claremont McKenna College, Sweet, who grew up in a middle class Tustin, Calif. family, decided to study international relations and learn Chinese. Then, after a 17-year law career which saw her become the first woman partner at her firm, she took a leap to Accenture and tech consulting where she would eventually earn the top job—even though she knew nothing about technology at first.
As the rapid development of AI has upended the business world and has touched everything from the customer to the front office, Sweet, Accenture’s first woman CEO and chair of the board, says companies also have to reinvent themselves from top to bottom.
Rewiring, as Sweet describes it, means abandoning the mindset of business as usual.
Sweet said the AI revolution needs to be led by executives, who are on the pulse of AI. They also need to not be afraid to change course, as Sweet, herself, has done at Accenture by rethinking her own initiatives from years ago.
“The real promise of it is to use it at the core of your business and be able to change your trajectory.”
