LIVE! Is A.I. changing the way we think? With Charli Nordone, Gabrielle Dolan and Paul Spiers

36:01Yeah, I am, but we're doing it in a way that doesn't either increase the gaps we're currently seeing, particularly in terms of, as we said, Gen Z expectations and how native they are to AI and content creation and potentially already seeing that critical thinking losses in the established workforce. How do we keep humans in the loop in a way that it means that AI is working effectively? So I guess it comes back to some really basic questions about why we're putting AI into any organization. So if we're adopting AI because we've all done it, we've done it with social media, we've done it with PowerPoint, as Gabrielle has said in the 90s.

36:46there's a lot of organizations who are adopting AI because the organization down the road has or their competitors have, but there's not a great deal of strategic understanding, I think, sometimes of why and how AI can benefit that organization. So even if we ask five simple questions when we're looking at investing in AI, what will add it in terms of how we deliver on our core purpose and impact and innovation? So what will it add? When is it appropriate to use it? So what are the protocols around using AI within our organization? Critically, how is it going to empower, engage, and excite our employees rather than create frustration or fear?

37:24Where are the issues that it's going to create? What do we need to consider? Where can it go wrong? And that's where the human in the loop comes in. And I think even if we start with those five questions, then the human in the loop question within an organization becomes clearer because we understand how we need to assess it, where humans need to be critical in their thinking of AI, where they need to check in on it, and where AI can operate seamlessly within that organization. So again, all of these things come back to treating AI as foundational and fundamental to changing the way businesses operate, rather than seeing AI as a plug-in tool.

38:01We have problem A, and it's going to be solved by AI solution B. This isn't a SaaS tool and it isn't just a technology. It's going to be foundational in the way we deliver business in the future. And as leaders and organizations, we need to be thinking in that way that this is going to fundamentally change the way we do business. So the what, the when, the why, the hows and the who's need to be asked from the outset. We get that right, that we understand where humans fit into the loop within AI within that organization and we also empower humans in that process i think and so regardless of the generations it is about understanding where they fit in where humans can add value to it and where ai adds value to that organization as well other thoughts you you look like you might want to say something charlie's okay gabriel you go first charlie um so i yeah i think there's a word to add when we talk about humans in the loop and it's got to be capable that when we're thinking about uh either the person doing some reviewing uh or the person producing something alongside ai we've we've got to have capabilities first bringing it back to what you said earlier um leanne about knowing what good looks like we do have to know what it looks like to know whether we're being served up slot board not slot um but i think also that when it comes to organizations there is a job to do to make sure people have the skills um and then also give a safety net so giving people guidance on how they should be using ai um transparency uh guidelines as well so people have to explain how they're using ai but i think there's also something interesting in being able to test the thinking of people within an organization even perhaps by doing something like having to give a verbal summary of a document that they're producing um having to be able to do a Q &A session around it um but I agree with what Paul was saying there needs to be some very clear reasoning about why AI is going to into an organization how it's going to be used and I'm not hearing enough of organizations thinking about how they're going to protect the critical thinking any conversation i've had on that has been with schools which is heartening i think because schools are taking this way more seriously so i've spoken to quite a few now that want training for their teachers and for their students about how to operate with ai how to be transparent about it how to do effectively how to keep those skills going um organizations not so much uh i I think we need to see that need because it's not something I'm hearing as yet.

40:45I think there's the knowledge that there's something happening, but I can't see the action yet, and I think that's going to be really important. Gabriel? I took your question, Lee, from a communication perspective. So we were talking about how you do content and how you keep humans in the loop. I may be very biased here, but I think storytelling and personal storytelling crosses, first of all, it crosses all generations. And a lot of people, you know, I've spent the last 20 years teaching business people how to communicate more effectively through stories. And one of the most powerful yet underutilized type of story is a personal story.

41:28And what I mean by that is it just, it's not deepest, darkest fears type personal story and oversharing, but it's just something that didn't happen at work. And you can use it to communicate a work message. They're the most powerful stories people can share. And what, and AI can't replicate that, right? Because they're your stories, they're your lived experience. So storytelling's been around, you know, I said at the intro, I'm from down here in Melbourne, Australia. you just got to look at our First Nations people, the oldest culture in the world, and for tens and tens of thousands of years, their messages have been communicated through stories.

42:04So stories are really powerful. And they have the ability to build fast-track trust and respect and credibility, so they can actually build trust and credibility. So in a world, it's, you know, this is the eighth book I've written, and I truly, truly thought I would never write another book on storytelling. like there's only so much stuff you can write but I actually felt compelled to write this book because I had people saying to me will AI replace your stories and I was horrified by that question and then I had people ask me can you use AI to help with your story and my initial response was no that's cheating that would that not on my watch but I started to experiment and said well you can use it if you're using it widely but so I truly believe that in a world of AI generated content where everyone's sort of starting to sound the same and in a world of distrust our stories our personal our authentic stories are needed now more than ever and I truly believe that and that's that's why I wrote the book basically.

43:11I think that brings us really nicely onto and they are buzzwords bear with me I'm sorry but authenticity and showing vulnerability and doing it in the right way using the right behaviors does you know improve leadership effectiveness like ability impact Charlie what do you think about this in terms of like we said we've got AI talking to AI we've got an absolutely critical human factor in in terms of that are we have is it already too late are we already moving to a world where ai generates the post ai writes in the comments ai is producing all the you know all the content as responding to it who's the conversation for and a leaders have they already kind of checked out of that i don't i don't think it's too late no i don't think so i think for some people they will continue down a path of AI generating content and AI responding to content.

44:09And you can see it on LinkedIn. People call it out when you can see those comments and you can tell that something has been generated by AI. But I think storytelling is the key to authenticity and we have to keep that ability alive. And I don't believe that after these tens and tens and tens of thousands of years that we are going to lose it but on an individual level it is yours to lose so I think there's a decision we all have to make about how am I going to engage with AI what am I willing to give up what am I going to keep hold of how will I get it to help me not hinder me but ultimately it's you know how do I Charlie turn up authentically because it's going to be different from Paul it'll be different from Gabrielle it'll be different from everybody else and I would want And in the same way, I suppose often I speak to my clients when working on coming up with their brand personality, that you should be able to put the thumb over the logo and know who's talking to you.

45:04I would like that to be true for me also. Cover up my name, but look at my words and you know that I'm the one behind it. And I know that if I don't use AI in the right way, otherwise known as ask me questions, don't write for me, I'm not going to pass that test. So I do think that authenticity is only going to get more important and it's the answer to this trust problem too. So we've got to be wise about how we are bringing AI into our personal and professional lives. And I want to hear your thoughts on how we do that because there is an element of, I think from the people I've spoken to, discomfort around putting themselves out there, particularly on a platform like LinkedIn where we've got organizations and leaders looking at it.

45:48how do you be visibly human and communicate that way communicate that in a in a way that is competitive and is going to add value to your new professional brand I think it probably starts with if you don't already know figuring out what your point of view is and actually AI can be great for that if you get it to ask you those questions and and dig into and draw out your thinking but Starting from that, what do I think about this topic or what is my stance on this? And then also one technique I'd quite like to use if I'm writing on behalf of someone else is I look at what metaphors they use. So if you look at, say, Barack Obama's speeches, he would use lots of nature metaphor.

46:30I can give you one guess what Trump's metaphors look like. They are more war based. But we each have a little different kind of footprint when it comes to metaphors. So you could actually proactively think about how you want to get people to relate to your writing. What kind of that kind of rhetorical device would you perhaps use? But trying to figure out, yeah, what your personality looks like. And I think AI is a great way of doing that because what you could do is get it asking you those questions. Perhaps even giving you some sample writing and you can feel your way to what feels like you.

47:04but ultimately what I'd say is as has always been needed and has kept me in business for 20 something years is people need the time and space to be able to practice these skills because I don't think we get taught well before entering the workforce how to write a work in an effective way that it's going to help us show up um so time nature without training is still gone on I would say. Lee, should we ask Georgia if we've got any comments or anything, any questions? I think we're actually near to wrapping up so we'll leave that to the end. Sorry, Georgia. I just love where that's at. I want to kind of keep it going because I'm wondering Paul and Gabrielle what you think in terms of what that means in terms of helping to build trust and connection.

47:55As you guys were saying that there is such a trust issue at the moment between employers and employees? What can having this, being able to communicate in a very human way, what can that do inside organisations and in the broader public?

48:12You go, Paul. Okay. I mean, I think the key to trust and authenticity is aligning your words, your values and your actions to Charlie's point, you know, and I talk a lot about vital values in a business that you walk into an office and you see these values printed on a wall behind the reception or in the boardroom or whatever it happens to be. And they're supposed to be a demonstration of, but quite often they just become a substitute for the values and characteristics that exist in that business. So the commitment to them is about as thin as the vinyl they're printed in, hence the term vinyl values.

48:48So the big challenge for organizations, for leaders, is how we get the values off that wall and into the hearts and minds of those in the organization. So how does that value that you espouse turn up at 11 o 'clock on a Tuesday morning or whatever it is when the administrator or the designer or whoever is doing their role. I think if we can answer that and ensure that our values and our words and our actions are in alignment, then we're a lot closer to be able to build trust within an organization and deliver authenticity. But it's when leaders espouse one set of values and then walk another one so they might stand up in an all-hands meeting and talk about those values, but they don't deliver it, they don't role model it, that's where the gap, the trust and the authenticity lies.

49:32And I think so many of those brand values are outward facing. So look at who we are, but actually they should be inward facing. What are we actually doing to demonstrate those values? Those are the gaps that don't encourage trust and authenticity, I think. Yeah, and building on what Paul said, I've spent probably the last 30 years either doing helping organizations do values rollouts, both when I worked in corporate and the last four, 20 years out of it. And the vast majority of values organizations have, they're just words on a wall. That's where they are. I believe there's two ways to get really people like really sort of embed the values and people trusting that this is the way we operate is A, do them.

50:19So if you say you're going to be innovative, be innovative. So actually live and breathe the values, but then the other powerful way and the quickest way is to share stories about it. So the vast majority of my work is I go into organizations, I teach the leaders how to tell stories to communicate the values. And what I find is, you know, they've just spent six months wordsmithing these values. And let's just say one of the values is integrity. I will work with one of the senior execs and I'll just say, so you've chosen integrity as a value. tell me what that means to you personally. And they will say something like, well, it means, you know, telling the truth.

50:58And I'll go, yeah, what else does it mean to you personally? And this would happen 95 % of the time. They go, hmm, that's a really good point. I haven't thought about it this much before. So after 20 seconds, they haven't thought about it. So I think a lot of the time is the leaders themselves are not clear on what their values means to them personally. and if you're not clear on what a value, even if it's your own personal brand, if you're not clear on what it means to you personally, A, it's very hard to live and breathe that consistently and B, it's very hard to share stories. So, and when I come, when I get to authentic storytelling, just to finish up on what I mean by authenticity, it's two things when it comes to authentic storytelling.

51:43The story has to be true. No exaggeration, no adding mayo. The story has to be true. But also the story's got to be congruent with what you believe. So you have to believe in the message. No point sharing a beautiful story about work-life balance when you don't believe in that. And I think when our, as Paul said, when our words and actions are not aligned, that's when trust suffers.

52:09Right. Love it. Yeah. Yeah, and you've taken us beautifully onto that last point around authenticity. And I feel like you've just answered beautifully what human-centric leadership needs to look like right now. It's having that alignment between what you're saying and what you're doing. I'm wondering if there's one thing that leaders need to start doing or stop doing right now. One piece of advice in terms of leveraging AI where they can, not losing critical thinking, what's the piece of advice you'd give them? Paul, can I start with you? I think everything comes back to curiosity and finding ways within your organization to create and enhance and really encourage curiosity.

52:56You know, if you think about curiosity as a seed, if it's nurtured correctly, that plant grows, which is creative thinking, innovative thinking, critical thinking. and if that plant flourishes then innovation is a flower that comes from it so everything starts within an organization if you're trying to grow an organization build a culture starts with curiosity so the one thing i'd encourage more than anything is curiosity but also curiosity with context so leaders trying to understand so the ai example is a great example you may stand up in an all hands meeting and talk about the productivity and efficiency of ai what often leaders are tone deaf to is that outside those four walls everyone's hearing AI is coming for your job so if you don't address the context of that sure it might be more efficient more might be more productive but how do we allay those fears and frustrations that people hear outside the four walls of that all hands meeting but that starts with curiosity as well thinking about what employees might feel about AI you can we've seen a growing body of research around data poisoning at the moment, employees putting the wrong information to Gen AI to produce the wrong results to encourage leaders to see Gen AI is not as effective and efficient as it should be because they have fear of lack of empowerment, of disillusionment, of frustration and all those other things.

54:18That could be allayed if the context was set, if the leaders communicated with clarity and consistency and with context. All of that comes back to curiosity, asking questions so that would be my one thing above all else. Brilliant. Charlie, have you got any thoughts? I love that. Yeah, I'm very much with you on that. I think I just want leaders to be asking themselves, what skills do I want to see in my workforce now and in future? And what am I doing to make sure that that happens, that I do preserve and protect the skills within my organization, that I am actively doing something to bring up the next generation of managers.

55:05And just being very, very clear, I think, as I said before, what the cost of AI usage is, if not done in the very conscientious manner in which Paul was speaking about earlier. But yeah, really just think, as a leader, am I proactively doing something to make sure that the skills I want to see in the next two to five years are going to be there in the workforce? Or am I actually bringing something in that is destroying them without any other action at all? So yeah, just having that awareness, I think. Fabulous. I think my final piece of advice is to not hand over too much control to AI. I just saw in one of the comments in LinkedIn from James saying, AI said is not evidence.

55:54So in my latest book, Story Intelligence, I actually wrote a letter to AI that I think I would love this to be my final bit of advice. I was inspired very much by Elizabeth Gilbert when she wrote a letter to creativity in Big Magic. So I was sort of inspired by that. So let me put my glasses on so I get this right. It says, dearest AI, creativity and I are about to go on a road trip together and I invite you to join us. I will be doing my job on this road trip, which is to work hard and stay focused. And creativity will be doing its job, which is to remain stimulating and inspiring. There is plenty of room in this vehicle for all of us, so make yourself at home.

56:38But understand this, creativity and I are the only ones that will be making any decisions along the way. I recognize and respect the supporting and valuable role you can play, so I will at times ask you for your advice and suggestions. But understand that I will always make the final decision and I will always be in control. Don't take this personally, as I know you won't because you're not a person, but I know sometimes while you are eager to please, you hallucinate. So sometimes you were wrong. You will also come with some built-in biases, so we are not always aligned. So you're allowed to have a seat and you're allowed to have a voice when asked.

57:18But my dear friend AI, you are absolutely forbidden to drive. I will always be in control. And I would say my final bit of advice is to leaders is to make your own commitment to AI that you will not let it take control of anything and you will always be in the driver's seat. I wish we had an applause clip there because all of that advice from all three of you was just yeah look at me being a nerd going to do applause we could actually actually just clap couldn't we that was so so so good Lee any response my final thought again all incredible I when I posted about this on LinkedIn one of the concerns I had was how people be feeling right now in terms of the value they can offer and I'm not immune to that I wake up some days and think do I still have relevance so useful in this world and i hope that after hearing that conversation you realize that humans cannot be replaced we are absolutely central and critical to organizational life and performance and work and everything that comes with that so so yeah echoing what everybody everybody says um to leaders don't use don't lose control be mindful um and keep it keep it human love that Georgia should we look I mean I know I've seen a few comments come in but my screen's really small and far away so I couldn't read them do you want to just give us an update what's going on in the comments absolutely yeah so one of the really interesting ones is from Claire Harvey it's a bit of a paragraph but it ends in a question so my question is is some of the natural distrust fear of the unknown when people When biro pens were introduced into the 50s, education experts said they would damage students' ability to write properly and limit their expression.

59:14When PCs first came into homes, lots of experts said they would damage people's ability to think and even that we would all lose ability to speak to each other. Is our reaction to AI just a modern version of a very old fear of change? Great question. Who wants to take it on? I've been involved in change management, rolling out, you know, digital transformations, we called it technology. I remember working in corporate Australia when the internet first came out and we had to teach people how to use the internet. I think it's a bit of that. I think it's a natural, we get new technology and we focus on the disadvantages, that this will stop us.

1:00:01You know, when calculators came out, it was like, oh, people won't be able to add up and stuff. And, you know, the reality is perhaps we can't add as much as easily as we used to, but we don't need to because we've got a calculator. So I think there's a bit of that. I think there's just a natural tendency, you know, we're not comfortable with change and we can sometimes focus on the negatives. And, you know, I come across people all the time that focus on the negatives. And I just sort of say, look, it's not going anywhere. And so there are negatives, but how do you embrace the things that you can, you know, that can benefit you?

1:00:42I think I'd add to that as well and say, yeah, I agree. I think in part there's that distrust and there's that fear. But I was reading something from, I think it was the World Economic Forum that was saying working with AI is relatively straightforward. You just have to be eternally vigilant. and I think that is the difference here is because with biro pens I don't have to be eternally vigilant I can pop them to one side and know that they're going to be exactly where I left them and then we'll do the job I want them to do there's something very very new and very different with AI because of its capability and how quickly it can evolve that we as human beings have to sign up to be eternally vigilant to keep it I don't know whether in its place is the right way to put it but doing the job we want it to do and not stepping out as you said basically um gabrielle it's not getting in the driving seat and it's our job to keep it perhaps in the back seat or even the boot sometimes i think the eternally vigilant piece is a really interesting one i think part of the challenge we face is that the previous industrial revolutions have always been automation and manual workers haven't they so they've got very used to to automating the manual process whereas this is the automation of the knowledge workers and it's probably for all of those in the knowledge industries, this is the first time it's happened at scale and at the size it is.

1:01:57I think there's also legitimate fear between the biro or the computer. They're all enhancing the way we work. There is a distinct possibility that for a lot of knowledge workers, this will displace or replace the way we work. And that's a legitimate fear, I think, but it comes back to the point that both the points that have just been made around how we remain vigilant, how we ensure that it is utilized by us rather than instead of us yeah i i agree the thing i'd add as well is how i'm seeing ai being used um or generation of ai for um management conversations coaching conversations to have to have a difficult conversation and my concern is that we haven't got the foundation in place already in terms of building and supporting and developing competent manages and it is that kind of cliche isn't it we already knew how to write the pen and the keyboard just kind of changed the the execution of it um we don't know how to lead we don't know how to manage so if ai changed that execution i worry for the impact on on the individual so i want to see that very vigilant around them george are anything else that um i know i can see quite a few comments people this is great because people are talking amongst themselves as well as brilliant is there anything any other comment that jumped out to you that we you'd like me to put on screen or something to be honest something that did jump out to me not particularly a question is lucia adams has anyone noticed they actually talk like ai now i found myself saying this isn't x it's a problem it's a y problem i read some research not long ago that um when ai first came about the word polished was not used however polished became part of people's vocabulary and it upped by a percentage of use what do you feel and question from me this I suppose is is how do you think the learning phase is going are we learning from AI because it's interesting how AI is supposed to learn from our inputs that we are almost taking on quite a lot of its attributes I think there's something that it's a it's bringing to life or bringing to to the front copywriting tropes things that writers know are really tired techniques to use in writing so it's not xxy or from x to y um or the other thing that i'm sure everyone keeps picking up on is ai's love of saying the quiet part out loud or everything's quiet or quietly done in some way um so i think probably the answer to the question is ai is talking like us because it's trained on what is out in the world, which unfortunately is not a whole host of brilliant writing.

1:04:41It's trained and it sees that there's lots of these copywriting tropes in lots and lots of places. So it's now just shouting it back at us. But I hope maybe something that comes out of this is if we all do stay very aware of these things that don't land very well and are quite boring and overused, like it's not X, it's Y, that's great. That's awareness. That means that we can reach for something else, reach for a different expression there's actually going to be interesting. So I don't think Lucia needs to worry about sounding like AI. If you're spotting what's going on, then that's more than half the battle done.

1:05:14You're absolutely right. Yeah, I think half of that is because of the real trap. And look, I do this. You know, if I've got to write an email, because I said before I'm hopeless at grammar and spelling, I just put it in as a spell check. But sometimes it changes things unnecessarily. And I was doing something, someone, I was going on a podcast and they said, send us a couple of paragraphs on what you do. And I said, I teach people how to communicate more effectively through stories. And I put a few other things and I just put it through AI to just, you know, help with grammar and stuff. And it came back and said, I help people communicate more effectively through stories that bridge the gap between trust and impact.

1:05:58and I just thought, what the hell does that mean? But so easily you could go, oh, that sounds good. That sounds really smart. I didn't because I thought I don't even know what that sounds mean. But if I had a thought, oh, that sounds really smart, before I knew it, I'd be going, hi, I'm Gabrielle Dolan. I help leaders share stories to bridge the gap between trust and impact. I don't know why I started talking like that, but, you know, that's what it sort of seemed to do. Paul have you got experience on this what are your thoughts yeah I mean I'm that's one thing I'm less worried about because I think all of us every day in every way uh you know whether we read newspapers or looking at LinkedIn or using AI we're all taking and using things that we're learning every day new phrases and new approaches to things so and in a way we're only if we're speaking more like AI we're only speaking like where AI dragged all of that information from that it's provided it to us.

1:06:55So we might be speaking like the Harvard Review where it took its information from and collated it and curated it. So that's less of a concern for me because I think wherever we get our information from, every day we're consuming phrases and new frameworks and all those other things that we're taking into our minds. That's just another information source from my perspective. Can I, as you were just saying that, what it reminded me of, and I totally agree, that we pick up new words and phrases all the time. And being a mother of two Gen Z kids, they're using language all the time. But it was like the moment I repeat it back to them, it's like, please don't say that because it doesn't, you know, if I say, oh, that's slay.

1:07:45That's slay. And it was just like, oh, my God, mum, don't ever say that in public. It was just like, so yeah, and maybe because it doesn't sound authentic or with them. It was like, mum, that was so six months ago. Stop saying that. But I think you're right. I think most of us can recognize when an advert is using, like you were talking about before, an advert which might say, the one trick that doctors don't want you to know about. And we all know now that's just, like you said, it was a trope, isn't it? It's something which people used a long time and then got overused. Now we're all aware of it.

1:08:17so I think the emdash became the first one that was about oh this is and now you've said you know quietly you often see the comments where it just basically reflects back exactly what someone said you look back on I go on twitter x twix whatever you want to call it and you just see these comments and comments comments comments but they've got no engagement so it's like someone doing it it's like what's the point in doing that because everybody knows it's really strange I feel I keep seeing on particularly on LinkedIn the comments that just as you say repeating back what someone has already just said.

1:08:49And I guess it's meant to demonstrate, I've heard what you've said and I understand it, but parroting it back adds nothing to the conversation and then it goes off and dies in a corner. So you've got to put your own thoughts, your own opinions in there if you want to. Maybe that's it, the continuation of the conversation has got to have us involved with our own active thinking and original thought. Yeah, I suppose it's in LinkedIn's interest to get more content on there and more comments in there to show there's more engagement. But in actual fact, AI could very easily work out which comments are AI and just bin, you know, shadowban someone.

1:09:23Can I ask you about this, Al? Because, I'm sorry, is everyone all right for another couple of minutes? Just raise your a bit. Yeah, yeah. I have been, I mean, we all get the automated kind of, they call them a pitch slap. Connection and immediately DM you trying to sell you something. I've noticed, I want to ask you this, Al, with your background in sales marketing. I get ones and I'll maybe like let them flow like two and I'll get the third message and I'll be like I'm guessing this is automated like my reply do you want to just cut to the chase and tell me how I might be able to help you um and I I've even now got ones I swear to god are still automated because it's going good catch you caught me goes on with the the automated sounding message is that what's happening there Al because in terms of sales flows it doesn't seem like it it should work that way i think though i'd love to hear your thoughts on this but i think that there's someone out there selling a course on how to do outreach on linkedin and then they and then someone else is copying that course and selling that course and these all courses say the same thing which is basically be a bit human i got one person who sent me a really weird message um with the word anus in it or something and it's like yeah i got your attention i didn't know and i'm like yeah but for not for a good reason it's just like i think be fair like we all know this if someone actually gets in someone connects with you and then sends a really nice message that's thoughtful that meant references something i've only had maybe a handful of these in the last 12 months where someone goes oh yeah i noticed you did this not i've used ai to pull out your bio but just go hey you did that how did it go or but have these also now got to the point where they're being automated like a chatbot is coming back in and they're going oh you caught me and it's still one of my favorite books by Seth Godin called all marketers are liars or something um and and his basic his idea is his basic premise is that marketing just ruins everything and of course that's a huge marketing and I've got background in marketing but it kind of does because we just ruin the lot and I think AI ruin everything so we are going to go back to a point where you can actually do effective marketing just by being a decent human being like can you imagine sending voice notes i don't know whether they will take off on on linkedin or not but it's still a bit different and it's fairly difficult to um to to fake something or make something sound authentic in voice maybe i'm wrong can i um provide an example personal experience with that because i um you know with my new book my marketing strategy was to get on a whole heap of guest podcasts and so i used a company that pitches it helps you find guest podcasts so it's using AI, you know, you sort of put in what you're looking for and who your target audience is.

1:12:07So it uses AI to find the podcasts. But then it also uses AI to generate the, you know, the first email, second email and third email. It normally stops at three. So I would just stop it, just don't respond. But what it does is, so for example, Leonel, you would have got this email. Well, not this one, because when I first started using it, the AI generated content would be like, hey, you know, hey, Paul, loved your podcast on blah, blah, blah. It really listened and it goes on and it's just so AI-generated content and it's implying that you've listened to the podcast when you haven't. And I had a real authenticity problem with that.

1:12:49I mean, first of all, my book's about authenticity, that I just wasn't comfortable with that. And so I removed the bit about that I'd listen to your podcast, but it still sounded so AI, which it was. So I just scrapped the AI generated email. So I'm using that pitching, that podcast pitching thing to find the podcast, but I've created my own email. They're pretty, I mean, it's the same email that goes to everyone, but pretty much standard, hey, cut to the chase. And I've tried to make it as sound as authentic as possible. And the amount of podcast hosts that come back to me and say, I normally ignore messages like this, but thank you for sending such an authentic email.

1:13:29And so you will get cut through if you keep in control and go, no, I know it would be efficient for AI to write it, but it's sounding all the same. And so I just thought I'd share that experience. Well, Georgia now, thankfully, Georgia takes care of all of our guest requests. We generally get probably what about sort of maybe about one a day on average. Georgia wishes. Really, it's more than that. Yeah, it's a bit more than that. Sorry, Gwanda, are you going to ask a question? No, no, go ahead, go ahead. I was going to say, Georgia, of that, how many, now that you see all the requests coming in, what percentage do you think it AI generated that aren't hitting?

1:14:15I'm going to go 70, 80%, a very large percentage, definitely. And like you say, it almost doesn't quite make sense. ones that are developed by AI seem so complex and seem so you know there's so much in there where I read it and I'm like I don't actually know your purpose here yeah and I say that just because there is such an opportunity we had one of the best guest pitches we ever had was somebody just just emailing us and going I want to just talk to you about the conversation I had about biscuits the other day because I think you're sitting light on the custard cream and people I'm like, we need to get a personal show immediately because they've listened and they've got a sense of humor.

1:14:58And of course, they had a kind of story to offer. But it's that level of personalization that I think is somewhat easier to do now. What are you seeing, Paul? Because you must get loads of requests in as well. Yeah, I mean, everything you've all said is exactly what I get. I probably get half a dozen a day on average during the week. and 90 % of those, 95%, 99 % of those each week, they're all just similar rhythms that have been produced in AI. And I always, one of the dead giveaways is because there's a particular issue with the new P &L and the ambasan in the middle, there are some platforms where I have to space the P, the ambasan and the L.

1:15:39And it looks odd, but that's the only way I can get it to look correct. and any time I receive an email where there is the P space ambusand space L I know it's just been scraped and it's just an automated AI email so it's you feel quite disillusioned in a way because I can't I can't possibly I don't know how you get on Georgie but I can't possibly respond to them all nor I feel should I if they've just you know taken the first line off the last episode and to your point said, oh, you know, really enjoyed the last episode with XYZ. And I mean, it's just, yeah, it's not worthy of a response in some regard, I think.

1:16:22And I wonder if that's going back in as well to what we were saying before about managers using AI to communicate with their teams. Are there going to be this kind of same visceral reaction of, no, I just can't even engage with this because it's clearly zero thought got into it. Yeah. And you stopped reading it. Like, Paul, you would just stop reading it and go, it doesn't even warrant. This conversation is sounding like what I spoke about with LinkedIn using AI, not sorry, LinkedIn job resumes. It's so quick to write a job resume that all these companies are getting inundated with resumes so that you have to use AI to screen it.

1:16:57It would be like, Georgia, you'll be now using AI to screen or the pod request to screen which one's actually not AI driven. And again, we'll turn up just the AI versus AI again. I've changed my LinkedIn profile a couple of weeks ago. You know, you can put your name, your first name, your last name, and something in between. And I've changed mine to Al. I'd rather not, thanks, Elliot. When I do get automated, scraped messages. Hi, Al. It's brilliant. It's brilliant. Which I'm hoping that everything shows signal. Fabulous. George, is there anything else? I know we're low on time here or whatever.

1:17:34Leah, is there anything else we need to say? George, is there anything else that we need to point out? nothing on my side no okay brilliant I mean if you do keep adding questions and some if you're not watching this live you're watching the playback pop down any questions you might have in the comments uh I know that all of our all of our guests are active on LinkedIn um so they'll be more than happy to to jump in and answer them but all to say thank you so much to our incredible panelists to Charlie to Paul to Gabrielle to of course Georgia our associate producer and to all of you guys for listening.

1:18:07We will leave all the links you need to get in touch with our guests in the show notes. And thank you so much again for making us the number one management podcast. Thank you very much. Bye-bye. Thank you. That's it for this one. Thank you so much for listening. If you would like to connect with any of our panelists, you'll find all of their details in the show notes. If you'd like to be a future guest on one of our LinkedIn lives, we would love to hear from you. drop us an email at podcast at truthliesandwork.com and if you enjoyed this please do leave a review it genuinely helps more people find the show see you soon