Want to be a people-first organization

Goldman Sachs, the storied American investment bank, is embracing generative artificial intelligence (gen AI) across its global operations, including its 9,000-strong workforce in India. In an interview with Avik Das in Bengaluru, Chief Information Officer Marco Argenti discusses his strategic priorities, the evolving role of engineers, and why being people-first matters. Joining him, Gunjan Samtani, co-chairman and India head, talks of the future of the firm's engineering hubs in Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Edited excerpts:

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What are the three most important strategic priorities for you in the technology world?

Argenti: They are AI, movement to the cloud, and uplifting the quality of data. We have to work synergistically around those three elements. And then we apply AI to gain efficiency and agility, and also find the ways people work. If companies need to leverage AI, they need to work on their data first because with bad data you have bad AI. We are in the middle of one of the greatest transformations with regard to the people aspect. We cannot look at this transformation with just a technology angle. Technology is only a tool and with AI, people need to develop new habits. Our entire engineering population has been enabled with some AI tools and there is a need to evolve the engineering profession and the way they work.

Can you describe those changes in the engineering profession and its impact?