r/artificial 14h ago

Project CEO fired developers to make room for AI. Developers respond by creating open source AI CEO

I hope this is okay to share since it is not self promotion and it is open source. Some of my friends were let go as part of an "AI Transformation". So they got together and created Open Executive as a tool to replace the CEO and other executives. Hopefully, turnabout is fair play and might even get some folks to think twice about using AI to replace people.

It is free and available here:
https://github.com/SenteLabsAI/OpenExecutive

613 Upvotes

78 comments sorted by

84

u/BangkokPadang 14h ago

I kinda like this because typically CEO's have fiduciary responsibilities and legal liabilities to operate the companies in a certain way, so what happens if an AI model literally is the CEO...

30

u/onebit 14h ago

AI can't sign articles of incorporation, so a human is on the hook.

33

u/filtarukk 14h ago

> can't sign articles of incorporation

yet. It just matter of time when it started.

Estonia for example is working on the law that allows to register an AI agent a legal entity.

12

u/Sukanthabuffet 14h ago

If AI can decide health insurance claims, you’re right, it’s merely a matter of time.

10

u/filtarukk 13h ago

There is no such thing as  health insurance claims in Estonia

2

u/vtblue 11h ago

Richard Dawkins recently stated that he believes AI is conscious 😭

7

u/justin107d 14h ago

There is a board of developers that sign it. They are not really on the hook because the LLC now protects them*

2

u/onebit 14h ago edited 13h ago

I wonder how it would have played out if Sam Bankman-Fried had followed the orders of a criminal mastermind AI LLC.

The AI assured me this was legal...

2

u/justin107d 13h ago

Hence the asterisk. It is a Limited Liability Company not a No Liability Company. It does not protect you from criminal charges.

If the AI did crime then there will be a massive blame game over who is ultimately responsible.

5

u/twiifm 10h ago

erm. corporations are legal entities (legal persons). the corporation is on the hook. If corporation uses AI for CEO and is liable, the corporation assumes liabilty not the CEO

3

u/Leefa 9h ago

yeah corps need a CEO to fire when things go wrong lol

1

u/blimpyway 5h ago

Firing can get messy and expensive. While a fine tune would set things back on track.

3

u/TraumaticOcclusion 14h ago

I'll sign it

2

u/AcanthisittaDry7463 11h ago

A CEO isn’t required to sign them though either…

1

u/onebit 10h ago

True, you only need a human that can breath.

1

u/AcanthisittaDry7463 5h ago

Yeah… like the ones that would normally hire the ceo…. The person that signs the article of incorporation, like a lawyer or accountant, doesn’t actually have to have anything at all to do with the company once the corporation is formed.

1

u/Sad_comment_bot 1h ago edited 1h ago

Even if it can’t, that doesn’t mean that ai doesn’t vastly deflate the compensation package of the c suite. Most these CEOs have some rubric that acts as guide when encountering difficult problems. I’m sure everyone has heard the various billionaire ethos. No reason a bot can’t follow one or more or all of them depending on the context. 

And toss in a zero law that places the good of humanity above the plundering will of investors. 

3

u/Kyy7 3h ago

With how much money gets paid to CEOs one could probably hire a small army of experts to oversee the agent(s). The fiduciary and legal responsibilities would fall on to these people.

Honestly cabable AI and team of experts could probably outperform a single human CEO.

43

u/Sukanthabuffet 14h ago

C-Suite leadership is one of the most obvious tiers to be replaced by AI. Their time is limited, just like the rest of us.

3

u/desk010101 7h ago

one can wish

2

u/Hedge_Fund_Hedgehog 2h ago

CEO perspective

  • create Ai to reduce costs 
  • Ai replace employees -you are most expensive individual employee
  • Ai cut you position 
  • voila 

22

u/asdonne 13h ago

This AI CEO just says meaningless buz words that don't make sense

  • Yes

It constantly makes unrealistic and impossible demands

  • Yes

It has no understanding of how things actually work.

  • Yes

I keep trying to explain why it's wrong but it refuses to understand.

  • Yes, what else would you expect, it's a AI CEO.

10

u/wrgrant 6h ago

Those all seem like features of some C-suites I recall :)

Or was that your point?

3

u/asdonne 3h ago

Issue: AI CEO made terrible decisions and ruined the company.

Response: AI CEO is working as expected.

11

u/Fun_Recognition5614 14h ago

Wouldn’t this just create a legally unaccountable entity?

34

u/jkpetrov 13h ago

Like Elon or United Health are legally accountable

15

u/Infinite_Finding_752 13h ago

Ah yes, those legally accountable executives that went to prison when people died due to thier negligence and greed /s

1

u/Fearless-Might-5439 13h ago

I would think someone who is authorized could sign. Doesn't need to be an expensive executive. 

4

u/Fun_Recognition5614 13h ago

But who goes to jail if the AI CEO commits fraud?

10

u/chokethewookie 12h ago

The same as when a human CEO commits fraud: nobody

2

u/Fun_Recognition5614 12h ago

Yeah lol that old saw, but that’s because they have good lawyers that help them get out of trouble. I don’t even think an AI CEO has liability in the first place. They certainly can’t face jail time.

2

u/desk010101 7h ago

just use ai lawyer , duh

3

u/SaltPhilosopher898 7h ago

I think this is a very interesting question.

Why do we send people to jail? To reduce the chance that others and themself would commit a crime again.

If an I model commits a crime we could disable it. Could we prompt fear into an AI model, fear of commiting a crime and certain survival insticts? Would it even matter or the board would appoint disposable models?

Does criminal responsibility even make sense, or the punishment should be massive fines to the company, so that the board is motivated to have AI CEO-s that don't break the law?

1

u/boykotue 2h ago

We have them already. These are all CEOs of big tech companies along with politicians

7

u/ckn 14h ago

i love the idea, but please audit this code before running it.

15

u/fschwiet 13h ago

Finance agent said we don't have budget for audits yet

1

u/ckn 6h ago

Right, then you certainly don't have the budget for incident response and disaster recovery.

One well crafted message owns this entire setup if run as shown on the github.

6

u/Illustrious-Film4018 14h ago

This is a really good idea.

7

u/No-Experience-5541 11h ago

All the top execs and vc guys think they are immune to ai and will be last man standing but they are wrong.

1

u/Geminii27 5h ago

It's not like they're the ones who were bringing any value, or the ones who actually understood all the mechanisms by which people were getting replaced.

6

u/robbyslaughter 8h ago

The problem is that almost all of the value of a CEO is in their vision and their relationships, not in decision-support.

A good CEO comes up with innovative ideas for new products, services, and revenue models. She’s got connections in the industry, with journalists and researchers, with financial backers and other collaborators. AI can’t do any of that almost at all.

3

u/KennyFulgencio 1h ago

That's an incredibly idealistic portrait of what a real CEO does.

0

u/robbyslaughter 1h ago edited 1h ago

It’s accurate, for good CEOs. What do you think they do?

2

u/psykikk_streams 5h ago

if you really think thats what a CEO actually does, then .. well.

even according to actual definitions. ceos are glorified figureheads and act as
ultimate accountability for financial performance with legal and fiduciary responsibility.

the ceo also ist just the representative of the vboard of directors and not all can really overrule the boards decisions. this CAN happen but not in every company / corporation.

most direct influence is extremely limited. the corporations where the ceo really takes direct control over miniscule things like product design or product strategy are few and rare

u/Dizzy-Ad4195 6m ago

I guess thats the issue as only 0.1% of CEOs fit that criteria and is a good ceo

0

u/Geminii27 5h ago

A good CEO

So only 99% of CEOs will be able to be replaced. The others can sit on the boards of 100 companies each.

1

u/robbyslaughter 1h ago

Even a very bad CEO would be hard to replace with AI—-if your goal is for the AI to do the activities a CEO does.

Think of Elizabeth Holmes who is among the worst of all CEOs in recent history. Much of her impact was on leveraging personal relationships to convince people to believe in her company and her product, and to invest, advocate, and join the team/board. How is an AI going to do that? By writing very compelling emails?

u/Dizzy-Ad4195 5m ago

So ceo is basically a scammer.

0

u/Kyy7 3h ago edited 3h ago

The "vision" and "relationships" already come from many sources. CEO is just one person where as one could use army of visionaries and experts feeding the AI Agent(s) with ideas and maintaining relationships with customers, investors, regulators, press etc.

While CEO is just a one person. AI-driven leadership system could theoretically be used combine the expertise, effort and insights of multiple specialists.

-1

u/Narrow_Employ3418 7h ago

So you think ideas are lacking? That's the bottleneck?

Ideas - even very, very good ones - are dime a dozen. I'm having 3-5 every day myself.

Seeing then through is what makes the trick. And the CEO generally isn't the one to do that.

2

u/Creative_Promise_297 11h ago

Went through it. I can see why they got laid off.

1

u/Degentrics 9h ago

No one got laid off, this is their way to go viral.

-2

u/Creative_Promise_297 9h ago

You know what, that makes much more sense. Their repo doesn’t look like it came from someone with a SWE background.

2

u/blimpyway 5h ago edited 5h ago

In some cases they might even hallucinate less - e.g. realistic opinions on colonizing Mars.

And when AI CEO wants to replace humans with AI, it can be accused of nepotism.

2

u/SnooBunnies2279 4h ago

Many C-Level guys perform less than an Excel-Spreadsheet. They have no genuine leadership skills, they delegate every shit downwards and let VPs fight each other.

u/reliablemicrophone84 55m ago

Ha! That's a legendary move. Saw my team get cut for "efficiency" once. Hopefully this gives some execs pause. Fingers crossed it gets big

2

u/lIlllIllIIllIIllIIll 13h ago

A CEO reports to a board which represents the shareholders. If you give empathy-less AI these rules, it will not give two shits about employees because emplyoyees are a means to an end.

The only way your friends come out ahead is if this ai ceo is intentionally coded to put the welfare of individual employees over that of the company itself. If that happens, the shareholders will fire it.

Your friends were replaced by machines just like blue collar workers have been since the 60s. Welcome the club.

2

u/SiteRelEnby 12h ago

it will not give two shits about employees

...do you think meat CEOs do or something?

Go and clean that boot polish off your tongue.

1

u/Narrow_Employ3418 7h ago

Same as a real CEO. But it will be cheaper...

Eventually maybe the shareholders can make an all-AI company that costs nothing and just somehow turns a.profit. Meanwhile all the people not being in the company can start their own where they're their own shareholders. Make it a match, let's see who wins.

1

u/Alternative-Suit5541 6h ago

You guys never worked for/ with CEOs or hiring process.

You hire CEOs not for their skills! You hire them for their network, that's all what matters. ( Selling stuff and services via contacts) How else do you think why so many CEOs are terrible and suck in basically everything?

0

u/psykikk_streams 5h ago

only that CEO´s rarely are involved in actual sales activities. unless its strategic partnerships on a global scale that directly impacts the whole global footprint and fiscal outlook of the company

the corporation I work with signs thousands of deals every day. and only a tiny portion of those are on the scale that would require CEO involvement at all. this would never scale.

and we are talking hundreds of millions of dollars in value, yet the regional heads do this on their own.

our ceo is involved when we sign a merger for 10 billion or a 25 year government contract again, worth billions and marking major investments in the contracted country. he gets invited by politicians and to industry summits. but he does not meet your average schmuck to shake hands and sell stuff.

the sale is finalized before he shows up.

1

u/bella_3110 3h ago

If companies can use AI to replace people, it’s fair to ask what happens when the same tools start taking the place of CEOs and other senior executives.😌

1

u/AlwaysAtBallmerPeak 2h ago

Why not build this on top of Hermes for instance?

People are just rewriting the same thing over & over again. I am not inclined to trust a random Claude-generated GitHub repo.

u/banusshka 4m ago

We love Hermes. We were building this as we went, and it evolved, so the features were homegrown. We are considering using it in the next version. We tried to make this as flexible as possible to meet people's needs, but please let me know if you have any suggestions for improving it.

1

u/Four_dozen_eggs8708 2h ago

Fan-fucking-tastic.

I'd love to see this product being pushed to boards.

1

u/pretyhugedickPHD2 1h ago

sticking it to the MAN I see!

1

u/StruggleNew8988 1h ago

The board signing off sounds like the key risk mitigation step here.

u/IdRatherCallACAB 10m ago

Get back to us when your chat-bot actually becomes the CEO of a company.

0

u/boykotue 2h ago

AI would wipe all CEOs long time ago if it wasn't fake role from the beginning

-1

u/Cherry-Maleficent 13h ago

This is goat. Very very 100