Engineer woes: AI can do thinking for me

Last month I was invited to speak to a group of young engineers. Before I went up, someone flashed this slide on the screen, the one with all the “future skills” we need. Creative thinking, analytical thinking, AI literacy, systems thinking, ethics, collaboration.

Everyone nodded as if these were superpowers only AI can give them.

One boy whispered to his friend, “Now Gemini 3.0 and ChatGPT 5.1 can do all this. What’s left for us?”

I looked at him and smiled.

“Let me tell you something.”

In 2024, there was a project manager I coached. Brilliant guy, technically perfect. He used every tool, AI, data, dashboards, automation, yet his team was falling apart. Deadlines slipped, people avoided him, tension filled the room.

One day he said to me, “Andy, I don’t understand. I have all the skills. Why is nothing working?”

I asked him one question:

“When was the last time you showed someone you cared?”

He went quiet.

The next week, he tried something simple.

He asked a stressed teammate, “Are you alright? How can I support you?”

He apologised to another for being harsh.

He thanked a third person for staying late.

Within a month, the team performed better than ever. The same tools. The same AI. The same systems.

The only difference was love, the courage to care, the courage to connect.

And I told the young engineers that day:

“You can let AI think for you. But only you can make people feel safe, valued, and inspired.”

That is Love Intelligence.

Not soft. Not romantic.

It is the one power AI cannot copy.

LQ makes people trust you.

LQ makes teams follow you.

LQ makes you irreplaceable in an AI world.

And if you master LQ: the 3Cs of Care, Courage and Connection, every tool, every model, every AI will simply multiply your impact.

LQ book is at Amazon at here or https://asiatrainers.org/lqamazon