How do you keep up? How do you do your day job, while transforming yourself, your team and your business to thrive in the intelligence age?
I returned as a guest on Laura Hannan’s LinkedIn live on Scaling AI in Sales & Marketing yesterday. She reminded me that it’d been 6 months since my last appearance. She asked what had changed.
A lot has changed in 6 months
Back then, we had powerful LLMs – but they just blurted out the first thing that came to mind. Just like playing ‘just a minute’ – the classic game popularised by UK talk-radio station BBC4 – where contestants have to talk for 60 seconds on a topic without hesitation, deviation, or repetition. It’s hard to be smart when you don’t have time to think
But now we have reasoning models. First o1, then deepseek r1, then Google and X and Meta got in on the act. And now we have OpenAI’s o3.
Wow.
That’s the model that have caused many to say they ‘feel the AGI’ – that is, they get a sense that it feels a bit like working with a really smart human. Until it does something dumb. But we all do dumb *** every now and again, don’t we?
o3 is brilliant. Partly because it’s really smart, and can connect concepts and ideas and write and debug code better than any AI I’ve worked with, but mainly because it’s agentic. It can – and does – search the web, run calculations, create and edit documents, and create pretty pictures to put inside of them.
Back then, we got the first glimpse of real conversational voice AIs, with OpenAI’s new ‘advanced voice mode’, and the APIs released shortly after.
Now most platforms can deliver realtime, or near-realtime conversations via voice. That’s what caused me to suggest that ‘conversational AI is a solved problem’
And it’s all explained by ‘the most important chart in tech’.
AI is smart, and getting smarter – in many cases much smarter than humans.
And it can talk. We have literally ‘taught robots to talk’.
Now, as our Chief Product Officer, Michael Fisher has said: “we need to put them to work”
And that’s why, over the next few weeks, we’re going to be making some changes aimed at bringing together a broader cross section of ideas in a coherent way that will help you ‘Ace the pace of change’.
You have a day job. But that job is going to change. How do you navigate the uncertainty at speed, without dropping a ball, and without losing sight of where this is all headed?
We want to make this weekly email a resource to help with just that problem. A newsletter that brings together the best of my ideas, and those of my amazing co-workers and friends at Waterfield and beyond.
What’s leading edge?
What’s trailing edge?
What’s off the ledge?!?!
If you want just my specific angle, you’ll still have the option to get it directly from me.
But if you also want a one-stop-shop for a broader coalition of ideas that covers Personal AI empowerment, Business Transformation, Technology industry context, Platform deep dives, and a broader, but carefully aligned vision on what comes next in Applied AI, CX modernisation, and Innovative IT, you’re already in the right place.
So hang tight, forward to your friends, and let’s go on a journey from Teaching Robots to Talk, to putting them to work.
In a way that respects your time, your busy schedule, and the reality that however great the AI gets, it’s the last mile that matters:
How do you harness an AI that’s smarter than most of us, most of the time, but often does dumb *** in a way that’s really hard to spot?
We’ve got your back.
I’ll share more on the transition over the next few weeks, and welcome your feedback so I and my coalition of thought leaders, practitioners, and last mile experts may continue to serve you well.
Kerry
PS: If you want a more regular dose of insights, follow or connect with me on LinkedIn for regular posts on conversational AI, mindset, and egg juggling, among other things!
PPS: You are building with GenAI right now, aren’t you? If not, what’s stopping you? Check out our blog on Gen-AI blockers, or sign up for a complimentary Strategy Workshop to help you get started.
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