56: Using AI for Community-Driven Education with Angie Carel

This podcast episode is sponsored by chiefaiofficer.com offering training and certification through the International association of Chief AI Officers. Interested in a new career or leveling up your value in the marketplace? Chiefaiofficer.com can help. Welcome to Using AI at Work. I'm your host, Chris Daigle. Each week we'll be learning how today's business owners, entrepreneurs and ambitious professionals are getting more done with smart use of tomorrow's tech. Let's get started. I want to welcome our guest, Angie Carroll to the call. Angie, I know we had this call scheduled back in December and holidays got crazy and we had to push it off. Yeah. But we had a chance to connect before we started recording and there's a lot of parallels to with what you're doing and the experiences that I'm having. So I think this is going to be a fantastic conversation. So before we jump in, if you don't mind, to share with everybody kind of where you are now and how you arrived at that as far as being an AI expert.

Well, I always hesitate to say AI expert to start with. Thank you, Chris, for having me on. My name is Angie. I had a marketing agency for 18 years and like I said, the worst and the best time I jumped out of my agency to pursue consulting. I actually pursued consulting to take control of my life, to not have employees anymore, to not work so much. And at the same time I had AI on in my sights. Like I knew it was coming. I knew it was going to transform my industry. And when I took on consulting, I was planning on infusing AI into everything that I did. But I although saw AI coming, I didn't understand how big the transformation would be. So I jumped into consulting about two and a half years ago with a specific intention of just doing it in the marketing lane. I was an expert in marketing and I can confidently say that and learning AI as I went. But then I jumped into doing consulting and AI marketing and quickly the corporations that I was working with said, wait a second, the marketing teams are having success. How can we do this? Here, here, here, here, here, here. Generative AI touches everything everywhere. And so quickly I started becoming the person that could help all departments everywhere understand how to utilize generative AI. And so I became more of a broad scope AI adoption consultant in the, you know, from the very beginning.

So were you already using generative AI tools prior to the release of GPT 3.5 in November of 2022?

Yes, we were at the marketing agency. We were already using the tools. I can't remember what the one was called, but like Jasper, any word. I think it was called any word. We were already using those tools, but nothing too. I had like that aha moment like you just described as we were talking earlier. It was when I jumped into it using generative AI, like more as a focus instead of an afterthought. I was like, wow, this is changing everything. And so when it became more of a focus was when I really saw the potential and started putting my emphasis on it.

So these clients, once you started consulting, did you, you know, was AI part of the narrative, hey, I'm an AI marketer, or were they had that go?

I can't say. So just to preface all this, it has not been easy peasy. Like, this has been a rough road. I think a lot of corporations are hurt. In the beginning, we're talking two years ago, heard AI, didn't know what generative AI was versus what AI is and was and has been for the last 70 years. There's been an enormous education factor here. People wanted to do AI because they just wanted to be the first to say they were doing AI. And to be quite honest, some of the CEOs that I worked with in the beginning just wanted to be the guy that in the room that told their buddies that they, yeah, they were doing AI. I'm just being real here. Sure. So I jumped into that right away with the kind of the CEOs that wanted to be that guy. And I saw that right away. I did start working with people and teaching the teams how to use generative AI and it was great. But no. 1 two years ago, none of the teams really even understood what generative AI was, the capabilities. And you know, I'm in the Midwest, so I don't believe that we are in the forefront of adoption necessarily. I do think that little sectors of us are. But yes. So in the beginning it was just sort of a. There is a major disconnect with what I want to do, you know, and my proposals and pitches were very clear. This is exactly what I want to do and what I plan to do and what the vision of or what the CEOs or executive teams thought that they wanted or understood what was going to happen here. So I jumped into roles and then very quickly understood that I needed to rethink my plan. So at the end of my first year, I kind of stopped working for everyone that I was working for and revisited my entire business model to rethink that and start over again. So it has been a constant iteration of what am I doing? Who am I working with? What do they know? What do I need to teach them? What are my service offerings? And it hasn't been really a straight up the ladder type of progress. It has been all over the place.

You know, you mentioned something about it hasn't been easy. Right. Like people that might be listening to this and might think that I'm gonna learn AI. And my experience was that being early. Right. Like you were. There was certainly interest, but it didn't necessarily translate into like overwhelming business flow necessary. I don't, I don't know if being early was something that, that you realize, like, oh my gosh, I'm early. And this is. There's a lot of education that needs to take place. There's you, like, there's personal upskilling that needs to take place because you have to stay ahead of the clients and the curve and all that stuff. The challenges that you were talking about, talk to me about that. Where did they come from? What did that look like?

Most of it is just that I would. I mean, it's hard to answer that question and I see simple way. But the challenges were enormous. They still are. I mean, they still are enormous. But most of my challenges stem from an executive team or leadership wanting to achieve what, you know, the conferences and headlines say they can achieve with AI, but not wanting to invest in the literacy and education of their education. Employees that are utilizing the technology. This is a huge disconnect. We need to train from the bottom up is what I say. Even though that sounds probably terrible, but like, I see a big disconnect in. And you know, I'm going to be. This is probably going to come off bad here, but I'm just going to straight up say it.

Yeah.

I think a lot of the upper level management and CEOs are seeing generative AI as a way to decrease workforce. And I think why do you invest in the education and literacy of your workforce if part of your motive is to get rid of some of them? And I think that that's a major, it's a major problem. So I think that what there's a. People want generative AI. They want it. They want it, but they don't know the problem that it solves. They just want it.

Yeah.

So they need a plan to identify the problems that it solves and then a strategy to put it in place to identify the use cases to solve those problems. But instead it's more like what I'm seeing right now is just we want it, we want it to do this, we want it to do this and we want it to automate everything. And it's, it's just, it's. Yes, parts of it are easy. Is that what you're seeing? Like, what are you seeing in yours?

Yeah. So, like, I don't have an answer to what's going to happen five years from now because of AI, because for sure, as you have seen and your clients see when you work with them, you, you can get more done with this technology than you can with, you know, 40 mules. What I tell individuals and business owners is that, look, the hard part of AI isn't learning how to use the tools, it's knowing where to use it.

Right.

And you've got these people who understand your domain, how your business works. Oh, she's got the keys. And on Thursday we do it this way. And if you come in and replace them with AI, AI is not going to understand all of that, that operational nuance. So I tell people that they've done the hard part and that's all the experience they've built in their career so that when they learn the tools, which isn't hard, they're able to go, oh, I can use that here, here. Oh, they can. Like, they, they make that connection. The, one of the things that we like to do is have a meeting with a leadership team and just make sure that they're all at 101. We do like a presentation so that it kind of demystifies it for them and they don't think, hey, can I just push this AI button and get rid of the HR department? Like, they need to understand stuff and the way that we approach it. Two steps. Let's figure out a use policy or some guidelines.

Yeah.

So that everybody understands like the right and wrong way to use it in our company. And then we do the training and then we kind of, you know, start with pilot so that it's not just a switch that we flip. And all of a sudden, you know, people are learned, like figuring out the wrong things while they're on the clock kind of thing.

Yeah, I take a very similar approach. And I try, I try to take that similar approach, but I have been met with resistance, even with CEOs that don't want to put policies in place because they don't the value of policies, which they think they're being forward thinking because they don't want to restrict their employees. But I explain it that by putting the policies in place, you're actually freeing your employees to experiment by giving them guardrails and Giving them protection and letting them explore and experiment and not letting them go off the cliff. But I have had CEOs also that just say, no. Oh yeah, no, we want to be forward thinking. We don't want any rules. We just want to let them, you know, and so that, that too, I've had, you know, people that are, that have said just the opposite, but I, and then I say we need to get. I agree 1000% with you, Chris. Is that the people. And this is re. This is my most recent like passion or efforts. Is that a workshop, company wide workshop that levels the understanding of generative AI. I don't care if you have been using generative AI for two years. The likelihood that you actually understand what's happening under the hood, how it works, how it's progressing is unlikely because I've done workshops now for, I've done an intro to generative AI workshop now for a year. And the people that are using generative AI leave the workshop and say, oh my gosh, this changes everything. And so like that first workshop, just invest in getting your team at the same level so that you are sure that everything, the language that you speak moving forward. If you say ll M, everybody in your company knows what that means and what L and L and M stands for. You know, it's just like that. I just wish it were so much easier for companies to see the value in that. And just to say, oh yeah, you know, for however much it costs, like that is just an essential starting point. Even if that means reeling back, you know, walking back a few steps, yes, let's do that. And I just wish it were a lot easier and more clear for companies to see that value.

So these companies, when they reach out to you, as far as your marketing goes and the marketplace, what are they, what are they reaching out to you for?

Well, I'm in my area. I'm one of the few that are, that are doing is, is doing AI consulting. So I get a lot of.

So you focus on local businesses primarily?

Well, I have a large community here in my local area and by word of mouth I am, you know, talked about by a lot of people. I don't do any marketing myself at this point. I am trying to streamline, productize and sort of do some things. But I'm like you probably. I am so busy with, will you speak here? Will you do a workshop here? Will you be on this podcast? Yeah, yeah.

Thank you.

And I like it and I love. And I have a, you know, I want to spend my time also with my community and I'm really right now this year focused on individual learners. You know, the World Economic Forum just indicated that the United States initiating the AI learning is through the individual learners by a huge percentage, something like 90%. So corporate America is not supporting necessarily or initiating the people learning, their, their AI learning journey, but the people are. Yeah, the beaucoup money is not in the individual learners and I don't care about that, but supporting the people that are saying, I see the value, I want to be in charge of my career growth, I'm going to learn. So I'm shifting my focus a little bit right now and I kind of say like some of these corporations, and this is going to sound bad too, but you know what we said at the marketing agency, the people that didn't, you know, you do your marketing pitch and they don't, they say, ah, we're going to try to do it ourselves. We say, you'll be back, you'll be back and when you do, you'll be the most loyal client ever. That's where I feel a little bit corporate has to do. They have to like a toddler, you know, they have to fall before they walk. And I'm seeing a lot of corporations that I work with try to help, try to consult kind of hiring an internal growth officer, hiring a non a person that knows nothing about AI, but one that wants to take on that role that will epically fail understanding the potential of generative AI.

Yeah.

And they're hiring that person that, oh, I'd like to, but that person has a hundred hats to wear and 100 roles to fill. And that person is going to try to figure out the AI. They're going to fail. Yeah, they're going to fail. Especially if they don't understand the landscape of AI, of generative. And so in my space, in my Midwest understanding and area, and I truly believe that it filters into every area of the United States in some capacity. I feel that some of the corporations have to fail and maybe fail fast and fail epically in order to understand the value of the chief AI officer or the head of AI, that role. Because that role is an unusual role that's never existed in corporate America before because it's a role that has to translate tech to people. And it's an unusual role. And I don't know that the value of that is understood. And those of us that are trying to navigate the space aren't very good at explaining what our value is. Or at least I'm not. And so I think that corporate has to fail. And with AI you can fail big and fast over and over again because you can do things so fast. And so I'm kind of like in a space where I am helping some companies and I love, I love the agencies, marketing agencies and I love the smaller. But I do think that some people have to learn a lesson, you know, a little bit of a lesson before they really start to value and hold, hold these AI officer, chief AI officer positions at a higher level than what they currently are. I think they're trying internally first and.

You know, I think one of the challenges was that because the analytical side of AI has been around so long, there was already an established kind of taxonomy and curriculum and things like that. So individuals who early on wanted to learn about AI, that's what they found and they went in there and they learned about neural networks and, and you know, deep learning. And that does not help you most businesses at some point perhaps, but the real value is not going to come from somebody understanding how a neural network works.

Yeah, the efficiency gains come with translating in my opinion, translating task based use cases into workflows. This is where IT starts anyway and then it needs to be transpire from that. But that's where the disconnect is. AI is not the IT department, right. In any capacity. If anything, I would argue that it is the marketing personnel that understand generative AI and ITS capabilities more than anyone. Because marketing IT touches every single aspect like the image, visual data, text, like so. Whereas I can see why understandably corporations think it. But it's try to get your IT department to translate generative AI into creating assistants that manage automations for email organization and replies like it. Yes, it's a new language. It just that doesn't work.

This is fascinating because you know, as I mentioned before the call like this is like the frontier. There's just nobody out here, right? Yet independently we're seeing the same things. I agree on the IT side of things. If anything, IT has held and for IT professionals listening. We love you in the generative AI world. Please don't.

We need you, we love you.

But this is not an IT role. It's a, it's more like a domain, somebody who understands and they would agree.

I mean I. Those that understand generative AI absolutely know this is not them.

And when we talk to companies and they say well we don't have anybody using AI, I'd say hold on, let me talk to the marketing team. Right. Because they've always been digital marketers are eager to test out New tools and things. So they weren't afraid of the technology. And so like, those are some interesting parallels that you're experiencing that we're experiencing as well. So the individuals, you said, the individual learners that you're talking to, who are they?

Have you noticed, oh my gosh, they're everyone, everywhere. There's no pattern. There's like, we call them a diverse group of people. Like they're from, you know, PhD at university to retired. A lot of retired individuals, which I love.

We see the same.

Yeah, we see high school students that are trying to figure. Figure out, navigate their own learning journey. To people in corporations that the corporations aren't supporting AI adoption or to people in corporations. You know, at my last workshop last week, I had individuals from a corporation that is very successfully adopting AI, has been for years, and they're known for how well they've done it. But the marketing, the individuals are still looking at their screens saying, what do I do with this? To the people that there's a company well known that's also saying, absolutely never use this. We will not. We don't let. You cannot use ChatGPT. So, like. But the individuals are taking it on themselves to say, and I argue that the companies that, that say you cannot use AI, generative AI are going to lose their employees because these individuals are pursuing their own. They're taking their career into their own hands and saying, hey, sorry, Charlie, I know that this is important for my future, so I'm learning, but there is absolutely no Persona that you could put on the people that come to my workshops. There's nothing that you could do to define there are everyone, everywhere, all ages and all education levels and everywhere.

Are you noticing any patterns as far as, like, what the initial questions are or miss the mis assumptions? I don't know if that's the wrong assumptions that people might have before they get kind of tuned up on what's possible.

The first, I mean, there's the first two things, I guess, that always come up. I mean, in my community, it's, it's, it's been around long enough and so forth. We have constant conversations. But it's about these two things. It's how do I use it, how does it practically apply to me? Like, what are the practical applications? Because people are sick and tired of seeing, oh, you can do this, you can do this. This is amazing. People are like, yeah, but I see that all day long. But like, how does that make. What do I do with it? And then ethical concerns. Those are the two things that will Be always. I joke around when I do a keynote or a speech or anything on stage, and I open the door for questions I will put money on. The first question being, but what about copyright and ethical use? You know, and. Which is right. Rightfully so I just say that's a topic for another person and another day.

Good point.

But it's that, like, there's a disconnect with what, you know, OpenAI is saying. This is game changer. You know, we've launched Operator. It controls your screen. It does. Yeah. Okay. You can book your flights. Okay. Well, that means nothing to me. The everyday people.

Yep.

Like, they're still a year behind. So that's just like, they just want practical use cases. They just want to know, like, what. What are this thousand things that I heard? What's the one thing that I can take and I can apply today to help move the needle forward? That's it. That's what I'm seeing. And they're frustrated and they're exhausted from hearing all this.

Is it because they're trying to keep up or what. What is. Or they just. They're like, kind of scrambling and don't know, like, don't have any stable data to attach to. Oh, this is the direction they.

You know, if you've ever been in a position where you know you should do something, you know you should. And every day you kind of try, but you can't get anywhere. That's how everyone feels. Everyone knows they should learn generative AI and they're trying, but every time they. Literally every time they look at their computer. I had someone say this to me last week at a meetup. I've been to a million conferences that have told me I need to create an AI assistant and how easy it is. It's so easy to do, but every single time. And this company has successfully adopted AI within every department of the huge company. She says, but every time I look at my computer, I know I should do this. And I know it's so easy. Every time I look at my screen, I don't know where to start. Like, I have no idea what I should do. And there. It's just. We've all been there. It's like a graphic designer looking at a blank screen in Photoshop saying, you need to design the most beautiful brand ever for a national brand. And everybody is waiting on this brand for you to design. Like, it's. How do you do that? Like, what's the first step you take? And that's what the individual learners need, is that that gap filled. So that's what I'm trying to do is just like, be there to also comfort them and tell them that this is easy to learn and it's okay to feel overwhelmed.

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For a new user, like, for somebody.

That'S coming to you and it's like that individual, perhaps. I see the little icon. The company's allowed me to use it, but what do I do next?

No, I don't have anything like that. I should. I'm still in the formulating right now. What I'm doing is taking what I've taught in corporate America to teams.

Yeah.

And what I feel resonated most with those teams. And I'm refiguring those workshops into workshops to offer to my community. And so last week, I taught how to build AI assistance through custom GPTs, Gemini Gems, and anthropic cloud projects. And so it's more right now what I'm trying and I took. It's really hard now that I'm a couple years ahead of everybody. As in, as Donald Miller also says is like, it's really hard to read the label when you're inside the bottle.

Yep.

So taking what I. I'm doing, if, if a new product is launched, I'm jumping into it and trying it and using it. Like, I'm building assistance every day. Every day, multiple. So to teach how. What do my individual learners. How do I teach them that? Am I moving too fast? Am I. Am I not moving fast enough? Am I dumbing it down? Do I make them feel like idiots? Like, I'm trying to figure out where that, like, where the happy medium lies. And so I'm. The workshops that I'm doing right now, I'm just collecting a bunch of data, asking, what can I do better? What did you learn? What were your takeaways? And so I'm just forming that I literally forgot to Give people the WI fi password. At the last workshop I over. I'm thinking so much about content that it's just right now and I'm doing them whenever I can because I'm also at max capacity and it's like I want to cater to them, but I also have a lot so. So you know, there should. I wish I have how. How many probably 40 AI assistants but there's still only one of me. Yeah, human beings and I, I mean I do have a twin sister. She does not do a. So yeah, it's make an avatar. Yeah. Yeah. But those avatars still, they just don't. They aren't exactly you.

Not yet.

Yes.

So you mentioned that you're building assistance with custom GPTs, gems and projects. Do you have one that you tend to lean on the Most?

I build 90% of my assistants, my functioning assistants, meaning not my personal coaches or strategy coaches and with custom GPTs.

For those who are listening there, you may not have even known about Gemini Gems or Claude projects, but you may be familiar with custom GPTs. What has been the pros and cons of the other ones? Because I have a personal interest in that because I'm like, you know, everything I do is with custom GPT as far as the assistants go.

Well, you know Jim jam for Google in general. I'm not a fan of Gemini itself, but I am a huge fan of Google products like their Notebook LM Deep research, like that stuff is like my favorite products but Gemini and so I have not had any success in anything with AI assistance except for things I did build a market research like a deep market researcher assistant and that worked wonderfully in Gemini Gems. Okay. Anthropic projects is strategy coach. I am a focus, a full focus like Michael Hyatt's full focus strategy. I built a coach for full focus and like things that are conversational or strategy personal I do in projects because I'm a huge fan of the way Claude has con has conversations. But when it comes to broad range capabilities, chatgpt just for me it's. It's easier. I can do it immediately and I just, I have a system in place that it's just, just I can have it done in minutes and so that's why I use, I use it there.

It's great advice. So for those of you listening, you hear about all these new LLMs that come out Deep Research or Deep Seat came out last week. I guess you don't have to know all of them. Find one that works for you. And for most people that I talk to that are professionals or power users. CHAT GPT gets it done. So, so don't feel like you need to be a master of all of these or even get the paid account for all of them. Find one that you work chatgpt that you like and you'll be good to go. So please don't. That's one area where you don't need to feel overwhelmed.

Because, yeah, the only people that need multiple paid accounts are the people like us that are just like constantly testing and then, you know, seeing what works for what. Because it's just overkill. Unless you know specifically that this is what I need for this, this and this. It's just, it's. To have multiple accounts is crazy.

So one of the things that you've mentioned a number of times is your community and you're not talking about the, the community that of the city that you live in. You've actually created an AI community.

It is the city that I live in and I only do in person meetups at this point because I'm a big like. As society moves forward with more and more capacity of working with machines, I feel strongly that our connection with humanity needs to be. It will exponentially be more valuable to us. And so since the beginning I have said, you gotta show up. If you don't show up, then you're not really in it. And so I have only hosted as far as the meetups are concerned. Meetups are a little different than workshops, but yeah, so it is only. I'm only trying to create an AI community within, you know, say 40 or 50 mile, you know, radius of my city. So there's no reason people can't drive to a meetup. But yes, I just rallying up people because first of all, we've decided that we want to be in charge of the narrative of how this plays out in society or at least feel like we have a say, we are having a conversation about it. We may not end up being a part of that narrative, but at least we can have conversations that make us feel like we can relate to each other. We are somehow, by having those conversations, changing the outcome of the way AI will be infused within our own lives. And so the community is a, I don't know, way of bringing people together to navigate this transformation revolution together, as well as a learning and collaborative space.

Do you encounter people when you do your meetups that you're, you're like, surprised at how advanced they are in the usage of it, or is everybody kind of, what's the, the temperature in the room.

You know, even people that have been using AI for many years are. I just. Someone messaged me the other day and said, this is the first time, you know, I've been using AI for years, and this is the first time I felt like an absolute beginner again.

Wow.

So I think there. I also sort of lead with. You have to keep a beginner's mindset no matter what. You know, like, I started this whole conversation. Someone. I get called an expert all the time and I'm like, are you kidding me? Like, not an expert? I have a hard time believing anyone's an expert in generative AI. It's moving so fast. So. But there are some people that are, especially in machine learning, which we, you know, we, we overlap in machine learning and deep learning and in the community meetups. But there's. There are people that advance, that are advanced, that they still like, they, they sort of lead conversations as far as big picture societal impact and, you know, ethics and. But they don't. Yeah, they're. They're doing demos and they're showcasing their work, but it. You don't know. They're super advanced. You know, we also, we have people that come and not, not in a negative way, but they, they have Vol. You know, we don't all agree. You know, we had a great conversation last week about whether or not the individual should be in charge of their costs of learning AI or whether the corporation should pay.

What was the outcome?

There was a person that strongly felt like the individual should be in charge of that responsibility. And several people that.

Were they in management or were they. Okay, yeah, okay.

But we had such a great, robust conversation around it. Arguments, a lot of conversations surrounding education and whether or not AI should be used in the classroom. These are very controversial topics. And these are things that, you know, we had, you know, conversations when the child committed suicide after using character AI. These are conversations that need to happen, but everyone's afraid to talk about them. Like, these are society things. These are real things. So I think that, you know, yes, nobody wants to talk about the bad things and everyone wants to talk about the good things. You really like, you have to the kids. The kids. I say kids. I called them children at the meetup, but they are high school students spearheading a group at their high school to talk about the dangers of children, of children, of. Of the usage of AI to generate porn. These high school kids are starting like this is. This needs to be talked about. The more we talk about it, the more the awareness is there. Like this is the reason for the community. However, it's a learning, collaborative thing as well. But these. These conversations just need to happen openly and not like, you know, my gosh, this is so embarrassing. It just. We need to have these conversations.

So I'll be honest. I avoid those conversations because I don't have answers for them. Right. So I figure somebody smarter or somebody with more empathy, like you will figure this out, and I'll just. I'll read it in a, you know, an article or something. So I think that's fantastic. How do you structure these community? Because we host something in Austin, I mentioned earlier, but it's more of a social gathering and there's. We're moving into a themed environment, but it's been just like, is anybody interested? We're overwhelmed with the interest, but we haven't had a lot of structure. But it sounds like in your case, there's a topic to address or there's. How do you guys. Like, what is the agenda of this?

We have a structured daytime meetup and an unstructured evening meetup.

Do they run concurrently?

No, they had. They're on different dates. Okay. Each. We have one per month. This. The daytime meetup has demos, community conversation, and then networking. And then the evening meetup is like an Alcoholics Anonymous meetup.

Yeah.

We sit around in a circle and we say this, and I use this. And that's, you know, the evening meetups are generally where the more controversial topics are. Are.

I think that's awesome.

Talked about. And it. You know. You know, and it's just. I guess it's because it is more casual and there's no. It's literally called the unstructured evening meetup. Because there's just no. If you have. If you're struggling with something, if you. If you need to find someone to help you with a topic or with building an app, you know, for that matter, you can meet up with someone there. And. Yeah, so it's sort of just. And I manage and run and make sure that everything is ready for those daytime meetups. But the evening meetups, the community is just like. They do it like. I mean, we. I put it on eventbrite and stuff, but the community just takes it and runs with it. The community is fantastic.

So are these people feeling some relief that you're creating community because they feel like they're out there in a vacuum doing this stuff?

Oh, my gosh. I mean, people will say all the time, like, I found my people. I'm so grateful to have found my people. It's Huge relief. You. You. No one wants to journey along any. Anything alone. You know, I. I went through a terrible divorce when, you know, 20 years ago, and I journeyed. I made that journey by myself. And for a full year, I was really a hermit, isolated in a house. And I, you know, that was a very difficult time. And if you're trying to journey this along by yourself, like, you don't want to be alone. Like, even if you're struggling, you want to know that other people are struggling as well. And so community. And like I said, I feel strongly that humanity, like, needs each other right now. I hate that now more than ever. But humans need humans. And I am more introverted than anyone would ever guess. And during COVID shutdown, I was like, yes. I was like, hallelujah. I don't have to see people. I loved it. But now I see my community, and I feel, like, so grateful for them. So I think that we as a society are moving in that direction, and we value each other and each other's time and more. And I think that this is it. I think community moving forward will be absolutely the most important and significant piece of the puzzle with AI. That's just me.

So in our chief AI Officer world, we have an online community. And when we launched the certification program, we were like, oh, we need a community, because people are going to need to connect. I had no idea how active it would be.

Right.

And it's like, I don't have to teach everything now I go there to learn, which is pretty amazing. And I think this, this idea, this concept for anybody listening, a see if there's one in your city and you host yours on Eventbrite. I think we use Party Full as an app, but find one. And if there's not one, like, what did you do to get started with this and your community?

I just threw it out there and said, hey, where's my people? And a lot of people say, how do I start my community? And I just say, like, have coffee with a couple people and throw it out there and say, where's my people? They will come. Like, it will happen.

Yeah. I think that's huge.

Other people have started, like, the AI in. I think that's kind of a trendy thing to do. But, yeah, just, like, if you just throw it out there and say, where's my people? It doesn't have to be any structure at all. For the first, like, three, three or four months, we just met and networked.

Yeah.

We didn't have anything structured.

And now you. I like this idea, because we do the nighttime thing, that's just really, you know, get to know each other kind of thing. But the thing that's missing is that structure that you do during your daytime. And I like that idea of having both, not trying to blend the two. So for those of you listening, if you're not plugged into something, online communities are great. But being able to know that there's other people in your own city where, yeah, you're able to go and hey, like, I'm going to be at the Starbucks, you want to meet me and I want to show you some new stuff I did. It's only going to encourage. And what I've seen is that by being together, like, you can't keep up with it by yourself.

No.

And knowing, like, like me asking you what's. What do you, what do you think about gems versus projects versus Because I haven't had time to build a bunch of gems or projects. So it allows you as a learner to compress your learning curve because, oh, you're interested in this topic. Tell me all about it so I don't have to go and start from scratch.

Yeah, it's, it's. I still tell people, like, it's the way to feel like you're doing something every month to keep you accountable in your journey. It'll allow you to learn a little bit. You know, it allow you connect with people to see where they are. People make. There's businesses that have started from people meeting at the community.

Yes.

Opportunities are had. Like, even side gigs are started. Apps are built like, this is a whole ecosystem that's happening and you don't know until you just get the people together. They make the magic happen. You just get them together. And I've had all of my opportunities, which is why I don't do any marketing. Nothing. Like, all of my opportunities have come based on somebody connecting me with something in my community. In 10 months, in 10 months, with zero marketing whatsoever, 688 people came through a community meetup. And we are a small, big, small town here. And that's with a lot of fear and anxiety about AI a city that's not actively encouraging or adopting. The people showed up, almost 700 people. We had 26 states, like six different countries represented because they happen to be here visiting, but who cares? That's a detail. But yes. So, like, they, they want this. They want, they want a community. They want it. And so you build your community and if you're a marketing person, you don't need anything else that's your engine, that is your marketing engine. That's all you need.

Guys, I think that this is something that is really worth paying attention to. Learning this stuff and listening to podcasts is great and watching TikToks and YouTubes or whatever, but the connecting with other people, like, how are you doing this thing? Right? Like, it's almost like you've got not even a large language model, but an actual human to talk to, which can give you answers, which is much better.

Um, and to say, like, I don't know, we. I think. And this is one thing that I did with my corporate, like, early on that I was like, this is. This is a game changer. I hate that too.

But it's a. Yeah.

GBT ism is sharing your wins. Like, when sharing is hugely beneficial and fail sharing. But when sharing. So in corporate teams, you know, we can sit at our computers and computers and write an amazing prompt that gives us the best output and we can be super excited about it. Where does that benefit anybody unless you tell somebody, this is what I did and this is how I did it. So if you're an individual solopreneur working from home, like all of these scenarios where you're really siloed, where do you get to like, share that and have that conversation with. And so sharing that with a community and just saying, I did this, and it worked really well. Well, that person will inevitably say, oh my gosh, that reminds me of this that I did. And just that exchange moves the needle enough for the following week, month or whatever to get you. Keep you going.

And I think that, you know, I routinely. I'm like, I'm not going to mention that because everybody knows that. But they don't.

No, they don't. Yeah, I do that too. I know what you're saying.

So I think that's another benefit to being around people is that you don't understand how much you know until you start talking to others about the subject. And they're like, tell me more.

And you're like, that's such a good point. Yeah, that is.

You know, there's a few things that I guess we'll call them theses that have developed.

Did you say theses or thesis?

I usually correct that, but yes, theses. I don't know what the plural of thesis is. I've got.

I heard feces. And I was like, okay, change of topic. Not an expert on that.

You know, one of the thesis. One of the. A thesis that I hold is. And I shared it with you before we started recording and that was that people misunderstand. They think, oh my gosh, I have to prepare for some huge pivot in my career. And what I tell them is, no, all the career experience you bring, that's what. It's not you versus AI, it's you with AI. Like that's, that's the secret sauce. And do you have any kind of, do you have a thesis that you hold around things that you've kind of said? You know what, I don't hear a lot of people talking about this, but, but I think that it's relevant and it's accurate about the zeitgeist of generative AI in business.

I'm on board not to hijack your theses. I'm on board with you. And I'll take it in a little bit of a different angle. A lot of times we have retired people, retired folk, they call them retired folks, come into the workshops and come into the meetups and they say, oh, I'm going to set the bar. I'm going to set the age bar higher here. Or they say, I'm just, I'm just here to kind of, I'm the old guy in the room here. I, I'm learning and I'm observing that the more real world experience you have in, in, in life and work, the more traumatic experiences you've been through and navigated through, the better you are with utilizing generative AI capabilities to the fullest extent of possibility. Because communication, critical thinking, creativity, all of these things are only learned and achieved through living, living experiences. And I'm like you, I think that it does not replace your career, your job or whatever. If you can find a way to utilize these things you've learned and what you understand and big picture and then utilize that with generative AI, you, you are setting yourself up for success. So I believe that the retired folk that jump in or the people that have reached a certain level of success, success in their career, they tend to say, oh, those young kids, they, they adopt this tech so fast and they learn so fast. And it's. With generative AI, it's a paradigm shift with tech because being able to clearly communicate to generative AI is, is. It changes results being average to results being extraordinary. And the, And I have two, you know, two college students, and we don't know how to communicate clearly until we have learned criticism and learned how to take, you know, or learned how to direct people. And so this. And I'm going, you know, a little bit more probably into detail than you wanted. But I think that what most people think is that the young kids adopt generative AI and know how to use it. They know how to use ChatGPT and they know how to pick up the tools and build an app. But when it comes to getting extraordinary results with generative AI, you're talking the difference between pumping out a blog post versus getting like incredibly good prediction analysis strategy. The people that are really great at the career field that they're in or have lived a lot of life and understand how to communicate well and they use generative AI way better and understand how to utilize it way better just jumping right into the tech than the young tech savvy kids that are coming right out of college. So that's what I would, how I would answer that question is yeah, and I, I love the retired folks that kind of say, oh, I'm just, I'm just trying to keep my brain sharp. And I'm like, you're gonna have a million dollar company in a year because your brain is, is sharp, you know, And I love that they're still learning this.

I think that's an interesting point because an easy assumption, if there was a new technology out there, most folks would, would assume that it's the, the more tech savvy of the group that are going to get the most benefit out of it. But my interpretation of what you just said, and I agree, I'd never really considered it, you know, externally before, was that it boils down to you having the life experience to know what to ask it, right? To get that, that nuance out of it rather than just, you know, crank out a thousand blog posts on a certain topic. It's, huh, if this life situation occurs or your understanding of how human dynamics work because of your career, because of your age or whatever, you are able to get into deep water with the models a lot faster with stuff. It's great that, you know, as a marketer you can appreciate, oh, that email sequence is written. It's not 100%. I'm going to go back, but I don't have to start from scratch.

I say like the people jumping out of college, they know they want the fire, right? They know they want the fire. But the people that have been in the career for a while, they know they want the heat or they know they want the boiled water downstream. The people jumping out of the, they're trying to make the fire because they know fire is really, really important. They use ChatGPT to make the fire. But those that are out, they know they know what's past the fire. You know, and so they want. That's what I've been trying to kind of like in my head, it's a, it's a, it's a pat. It's past the original result, but it's what they. And so to guide someone past or guide someone guide us being past, that's. That's what the people with real world experience are doing with large language models versus what young minds. Not that they can't do amazing things and build amazing things and probably amazing companies, but the utilizing of actual natural learning or natural language. I think right now this brilliance lies with the people that are really good at what they do.

I think that's very profound. This concept of, you know, action versus result. The seasoned individual who was using the tools isn't looking for the action. They're looking for the. They're starting at the result. They know what they're looking for.

Yes.

Well, Angie, I'd love to. This was a fantastic conversation and there's.

Thank you.

So many parallels between. Even though we've never spoken prior to. We got on this today, the, the sympathetic nature of what we're both experiencing is. I'm curious to find that more out there in the world. More Angie's out there. This is fantastic.

As we navigate the world as the painful, the painful consulting world that we love.

We might have some tricks for you, Angie, if people want to. Maybe they're interested in doing their own meetup or whatever. They want to find out more about how you're delivering. How do people plug into what you're up to?

I mean, the very best way I'm not. I have a create, don't consume mantra. The only social media that I exist on is LinkedIn. So that's the best place to find and connect with me. My website, you know, could be. Can be found at angie carol c-a r e l.com but in the show notes. Yeah, just connecting with me on LinkedIn and shooting me a quick message. I try to be available to have conversations with people and I always try to say I'm here to help. I really like we were just talking about before. There's plenty of room in this space. No one feels like anyone stepping on toes or competitive, much like it is in the marketing industry. Generosity here to help, trying to help move, you know, literacy efforts forward and so forth. So yeah, LinkedIn would be the best way to.

So I mentioned that one of our chief AI officers is in your community. I'm going to get you guys connected. And he and I are doing business Together. If I'm ever up there, I'm going to make sure that I try and coincide that visit with one of those meetups, either the daytime or the nighttime. It'd be fantastic.

There's another podcast recording right there. We can do it right here in this do.

Yeah, that's right. Very cool. Yeah. Angie, I really do appreciate the time. This is. You've given me a lot to think about. I like this. I'm going to noodle on that concept about the. The youth perspective versus the seasoned perspective.

Yeah.

And seriously, I'd love to. If you want to see what we're doing in our community, it's a free community to join.

Looks like I'm taking a trip to Austin.

Yeah, there's. There's plenty going on here, and if that's going to happen, I'd love for you to coincide it with when we do ours.

Oh, yeah.

Because as far as our community goes. And I'll. This will be the first reveal, I guess. So. I host that event in Austin with Rachel woods from AI Exchange and Kurt Malley from Black Box Social Media. Both of them are tactically and strategically very strong at the application of generative AI. So we've had some success. For anybody listening, look, we were like, is anybody going to show up to this meetup? We hosted the meetup and we had 40 or 50 people show up the first time. And they were. They were like, can you believe the people that show not the volume but the caliber of. Of talent and interest that was there? And last night, the three of us got together to talk about, hey, this is. This is something like, let's do something with it. So the name of that event is going to be the. The AGI Meetup, but not because Artificial General intelligence. It's because the focus of our event is artificial intelligence. Go to market strategy and introductions. AGI. Right. So if you are going to be. If Austin, if there's a need for you to be down here, for sure.

I mean, there's a need because I'm in the frozen tundra of the north.

We got one tenth of an inch of snow last week.

Stop the present.

So. But that would be great. Yeah. And honestly, if you are thinking about coming down to Austin, there's. There's so many talented generative AI people here. If you let me know what, like, what would be the ideal introduction for you?

Oh, yeah.

I guarantee your dance card would be very full.

Sounds like a strategic trip. Strategic trip.

Just don't come down during south by Southwest.

It's going to be crazy that's coming up.

Fun, but crazy. Yeah, well, awesome. Well. So everybody please check the show notes. I think that you'd get a lot out of plugging into what Angie's doing, especially based on the conversation that we've had here. And with that, we'll see you on the next episode. Thanks, everybody.

Thank you so much for having me. Chris, it was awesome.

Thanks for tuning in to Using AI at Work. Don't forget to subscribe for more conversations about how to use AI at work and a special thank you to our sponsor, Chief AI Officer for empowering businesses with AI education and training. Visit their website for a free AI Readiness Assessment and AI Strategy Guide to help you get started using AI at work. That's www.chiefaiofficer.com. so thanks to our producer Evan Desaulnier for making this episode possible. Follow us on Twitter at the handle usingai AI@work and visit www.usingaiatwork.com for free resources to help you harness AI in your role.