For many chief executives, success in adopting artificial intelligence is measured by the number of jobs they can eliminate. In just the past few weeks, companies have announced tens of thousands of layoffs they attributed to A.I., a wave that one global bank boss undiplomatically described as replacing “lower-value human capital” with technology.

But such views reflect “a very narrow understanding” of A.I.’s potential, said Erik Brynjolfsson, who directs the Digital Economy Lab at Stanford University. “A lot of people are under the mistaken idea that the only way that you get productivity from A.I. is by removing labor costs.”