Why do we keep doing this?

Today’s Thoughts ☠️

Hey there 👋,

In my slice of the world, Summer decided to start yesterday.

After 3 months of floods and tornados (I might be exaggerating a little). I find myself hiding in darkness typing these words on my kitchen table, and hoping a breeze hits my face soon.

Anyway, enough of my British protocol of talking about the weather to kickstart conversations. Let’s nerd out on today’s thoughts.

Before we start, a big welcome if you’re new here (my stats tell me 250 of you are).

This is the short version (depending on how much tea I’ve had) of my weekly word drops. Tuesday’s drop is the bigger brother you could say. I prefer to dazzle you at the beginning of the week and slide you into a relaxing weekend with this one.

If you missed it, we spoke about the 7 skills L&D pros need a few days back. Get your eyes on that when you have time.

I thought we’d use today to chat about the perils of not adapting to new technology at speed and falling prey to the thinking of ‘it won’t happen to you’.

Get your tea 🍵 or beverage of choice ready, we've got lots to discuss!

In today’s chat 👇

• Why you can’t be slow to adapt and adopt new technology

• How a Swedish giant upskilled 8,500 employees with AI

• 3 ways to position your L&D product for success

The Big Thought

We Have To Stop Doing This

I stumbled upon research this week (probably while doom-scrolling) that shared most Americans don’t think generative AI tools will have a major impact on their job.

But they do think it will impact others much more.

Is this a case of burying your head in the sand to the data all around us? Perhaps. It could also be that people just aren’t as informed as they could be.

For what it’s worth. I believe it’s a bit of both.

In case you’re blissfully unaware, 2023 has been the year of generative AI, with ChatGPT certainly being the poster boy for this movement.

It has become the internet’s new boyfriend these past 6 months.

Yet, the hype is now coming down.

We’re moving from the phase of ‘What the hell is this thing?’ to ‘Ah, we could use this for XYZ’. New roles such as Chief AI Officers have sprung out of nowhere with companies hoping to leverage AI tools to upskill employees.

So, what now?

From hype → daily productivity tool

For any new technology to survive, it needs to have use cases.

Luckily for generative AI. It has a bunch.

Yes, some are gimmicky and will die off. While others have practical uses to improve learning and performance. The big corpos know this and are moving fast.

Just this week Walmart announced it will give a generative AI tool to 50,000 of its office workers to use in their work. SaaS giant, SalesForce, was an early adopter of this when it released its aptly named “Einstein GPT” generative tool to its workforce.

Big tech is bringing its best too with:

• ChatGPT Enterprise

• Microsoft Copilot

• Google Duet

The hype may be dead, but the next evolution of workplace technology is here.

The question is are you ready to wield it?

Don’t be the last to the party

Let’s face it. The HR and L&D industry is slow to adapt and adopt the latest tech.

We struggle to connect with our audience because we fail to stay ahead. We’re always last to the party, and that sucks. Sometimes we’re not even invited to the party!

You might feel like this right now with generative AI.

It’s here, there and everywhere. It seems like if you’re not on team AI, you’re getting left behind. I don’t know about you. But I don’t like that feeling.

I’ve been playing in the ChatGPT sandbox for the past year.

I’ve been sharing this with global organisations as we continue to experiment with AI tools to supercharge our work.

But I don’t think this sentiment is shared amongst my peers.

I don’t see people practising what they preach. You can’t be a trusted advisor to your business if you don’t understand how new technology can empower it.

In my State of AI report for L&D:

• 77% of teams told me they see integrating generative AI tools into their team as critical for organisational success.
  

• Yet, 64% of those same teams told me they don’t understand generative AI and need to be upskilled.

Do you see the challenge?

Look, generative AI tools are not a Swiss army knife. They’re not the right tool for every job. But you gotta be in the know. You can’t make the best decision, otherwise.

How to get smart with AI

I hate Captain Obvious statements with no solutions.

In that spirit, here’s a mix of free and paid resources worth exploring to level up your know-how in this space:

→ AI For Everyone by Deeplearning.ai

This is billed as a basic experience, but I’d say it’s near the higher end of the basics. I’ve completed this one myself and rate it highly.

→ Learnprompting.org

Open-source courses for all to enjoy. Perfect for beginners all the way up to those advanced AI nerds.

→ The conspiracy to make AI seem harder than it is

Gustav Soderstrom is the Chief Research and Development Officer at Spotify. He leads the Product, Design, Data, Technology & Engineering teams.

That’s a lot of teams! He’s on a quest to demystify AI. Join him in this internal Spotify talk.

→ Just for L&D Pros: The ChatGPT Crash Course

Full disclosure. This is my product and it’s a paid one.

You can probably get everything you need at zero cost by searching my posts over the last 12 months. But, if you want an accelerated experience to teach you the basics in under 2-3 hours, this is for you.

Over 100 L&D pros have joined the course so far. I update it every month and you can chat with me (and others) in the free community with the course.

That’s my sales pitch done. I’d love to see you there.

Partner

Want to be a high-performing coachable leader?

👀 Check out my friends at Coachable.

The team at Coachable always impress me with their expertise and enthusiasm. They do leadership differently, and I love that.

They’ve just released their free Little Book of Coachable Questions which, I feel, is incredibly valuable to all leaders.

You can keep up to date with all the great work the team is doing in their newsletter too.

If you want to make coaching your superpower. These are the people you need in your life!

New Thoughts

Content that has just dropped or recently been updated.

How I can help you👇

1/ My L&D toolkit stack with 20 zero-cost tools.

2/ Work smarter with AI in HR and L&D in my ChatGPT Crash Course.

3/ Work with me on your projects and L&D challenges.

Please share your thoughts with me on these pieces or anything I share on LinkedIn or hit 'reply'. Chat to you soon.