A novel experiment at Procter & Gamble reveals that artificial intelligence isn’t just a tool—it’s becoming a genuine teammate that can match human collaboration.

For decades, the holy grail of business performance has been effective teamwork. We’ve organized entire companies around the premise that collaboration beats individual effort—that two heads are better than one. But what happens when one of those “heads” is artificial intelligence?

A remarkable field experiment involving 776 professionals at Procter & Gamble—and led by Harvard’s D^3 Institute, where I’m an executive fellow—has fundamentally challenged our assumptions about teamwork, expertise, and the future of collaborative work. The results suggest we’re witnessing the emergence of what researchers call the “cybernetic teammate”: AI that doesn’t just assist but actively participates in the collaborative process.