Things like press releases have relevance again,
as long as you frame the press releases in the
form of answers to an extent. Make it more powerful.
But I heard that PR doesn't help drive revenue,
Perry. That's what I heard. No, no. You feel
it in your gut. That was sarcasm for anybody
who didn't pick up on it. Anyway, carry on. Folks,
that's a joke. Welcome to Under Embargo, the
podcast that says the quiet part out loud about
PR, communications, and the chaos in between.
Hosted by two of LinkedIn's most connected comms
pros, Becca Chambers, a no -BS corporate comms
exec with raging ADHD, and Pari Hedrick, founder
of tech PR firm Crackle PR. This show brings
it all. Real talk, sharp insights, and the kind
of industry truths they don't put in press releases.
No fluff, no filters, no f***s given. This is
Under Embargo. Let's get into it. All right,
welcome. to the under embargo podcast i am your
host becca chambers cmo of scale venture partners
and i'm joined as always by my co -host perry
hedrick founder of crackle pr this is our first
episode back after a couple months off for the
summer of fun and summer of work and all the
things but we're more energized than ever to
be back and i'm excited for today's guest chris
g who is um Talking about one of the things that
I am most excited to talk about, which is AI
strategy for PR and communications people, which
is a very specific use of AI, which is rad. But
it's probably the most relevant topic to most
of the people who are listening to this podcast
right now, because we are all trying to figure
out how to use AI to do our jobs better. Before
Chris started his AI consultancy, he was also
head of digital for corporate affairs at Edelman
and managing director of digital strategy for
FGS Global, head of digital strategy at Burson,
among other digital communication leadership
roles over the past 20 plus years. So I am super
excited to welcome Chris to the show. Welcome.
Welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. It's
a pleasure to be here. Boy, listing off all those
PR agencies I've worked for makes me feel like
I should get a punch card. But, you know, really
excited to be here and, you know, really kind
of an interesting transition for me. My career
has been all about transformation. And so we're
in a very significant period of transformation
as we speak. And that's kind of the world where
I sit in. I started Chris G Consulting two years
ago. really kind of to address the AI adoption
curve and gap as it relates to public relations
and communications professionals, both PR firms
and also internal corporate communications folks
and everything. And you're right. I mean, this
is really an interesting time. This is a big
topic in our industry, and I'm excited to have
it with you guys. It's awesome. And I actually
think that's like the perfect segue to my first
question for you, which is. How did you decide
to make it specifically for communications, PR,
corp comms folks? That's a great question. You
know, I think for me, it really started, I had
the idea before I left Edelman in, I guess, the
early part of 2023, right? When we were all just
coming out of the holidays and ChatGPT and MidJourney
and other generative AI tools really captured
our imagination. I just was trying to absorb
as much as I could to learn as much as I could
about AI at the time because I knew most of our
clients were really going to want to know about
it. I also wanted to see what the use cases were
for us. I just really found that there was a
lot out there, but there was very little that
was relevant. I was looking for use cases that
were specific to my job, that would help me do
my job. I was looking for tools that would be
specific to comms and PR. And what I found was
a lot of stuff that was really hot up here and
very little that was more specific to what we
do. So when I decided to start my consultancy.
that's where that's the first place i decided
to focus i mean i know the space i knew what
i would need if i were still in one of my previous
roles i knew what my clients would need and what
they were clamoring for as i was talking to them
and doing workshops about ai and helping them
learn about it so that became my focus and i
decided to boil the ocean start with the community
that i knew and it just really kind of grew from
there Amazing. Can we get a little bit specific
about some of the kinds of things from a comms
perspective you were looking for AI to help you
with and others in turn would be looking to apply
to their lives? Asking for a PR agency. Myself.
Yeah, you're trying to figure out how can we
use AI to do timesheets, right? We don't do timesheets.
How am I just learning about this now? No, you
know, well, for one was, for instance, one of
the things that really bogged down and just took
hours out of my day and week when I was in my
previous roles was creating slides. slides and
spreadsheets. I'm sure neither of you guys have
ever had to deal with those, right? And so, you
know, and I would just, my day would just get
derailed. I'd get an email. Hey, Chris, we're
chasing this particular opportunity. We need
slides about your practice. And I would have
to sort of take 10 slides and crunch them down
to three or take three slides and expand them
out to 10 or 11. or take a deck that had been
tailored for one vertical let's say uh retail
and and morph it over to financial services and
they would just take it just would you know just
derail my day uh and it wasn't something it it's
a necessary evil but at the same time wasn't
one of the things that i was trying to strategically
do to drive impact for the the firm or for my
practice so um when i first learned how to use
chat gpt to help me accelerate the production
and creation of slides and slide content, it
was a revelation, right? It literally shaved
about at least an hour off of my day. And I figured
out how to hack ChatGPT to give me a link to
downloadable slides, which then really took my
productivity up here. So it got to the point
where, I mean, honestly, it felt like I was cheating.
I would schedule send slides to my colleagues
so they wouldn't know how quickly I could turn
them around. In other words, you would be done,
but you would delay it for a while. So they thought
you were working your butt off. Yeah, that's
right. I'd be done in about 30 minutes and I'd
probably make it like, oh, it took me three hours
to do this. You know, and I started to learn
how to train the AI and AI chats and everything
for more comm specific tasks. So say, for instance,
for thought leadership. I created the logic within
back then a chat and then eventually custom GPT
because the dreaded thing that all of us have
had to deal with is an executive who says, you
haven't learned my voice after they have blown
off every single meeting with you, not giving
you any kind of feedback, haven't given you anything
to go off of, right? And so I was able to sort
of cobble whatever I could together. upload it
into ChatGPT and just ask it to break down the
attributes of that particular person's speaking
or writing style. And then I would just basically
train it, say, hey, use this for any time I give
you an assignment. And then it gave me much better,
more predictable outputs. And then, of course,
I could tweak it because there's how an executive
sounds and how they want to sound. So it's like,
okay, we'll use this. And in one particular executive,
I said to give it a little twist and insert some.
uh bits and pieces from other people uh and then
that we kind of nailed it and we kind of arrived
at that so so really being able to kind of like
take the ai effectively prompt it and train it
for specific use cases like slide production
for new business pitches, like training it for
thought leadership content really kind of helped
me plus up my productivity. So then once I started
to do my own thing and train other clients on
how to do that, you know, really what I started
to do was incorporate other tactics and other
things that were just sort of common needs. That's
awesome. What like LLMs do you most rely on?
Yeah. So this is one that really makes it fun
when I talk to my accountants because I have
so many subscriptions. I subscribe to Claude.
I use ChatGPT. I use Gemini. I use Perplexity.
And probably like most of us, I find that there's
no one killer. app each of them has their strengths
and minuses they have different things that are
unique about them that make them really good
i really like the deep research agent for from
chat gpt and open ai i really like the creative
output from claude Although I think ChatGPT is
catching up with it. So there are different things
that I like and kind of keep me every month saying,
I still need to subscribe to this. So I don't
think there's any one in particular that's head
and shoulders above the other, depending on what
it is you're looking for. And that's typically
what I tell clients when they're trying to figure
out what should be in their stack. So my agency
is spending a lot of time, Chris, trying to figure
out. how to best position our clients to be delivered
in the answers on these LLMs, right? Because
PR is having a bit of a moment now where everybody
was writing us off saying, oh, who needs PR?
AI can do all that. Well, it turns out earned
media and third -party validation is more important
than it ever has been. And things like press
releases have relevance again, as long as you
frame the press releases in the form of answers
to an extent, make it more probable. PR doesn't
help drive revenue, Perry. That's what I heard.
No, you feel it in your gut. That was sarcasm
for anybody who didn't pick up on it. Anyway,
carry on. Folks, that's a joke. So Chris, I guess
my question is, to what extent are you kind of
deep in the world of helping either your clients
or yourself figure out best practices relative
to being found in those? LLMs at the point of
need? And what can you kind of say about the
state of that? Yeah, well, I mean, it's a big
area because as you guys know, what comes up
in these searches is really important. And there
was a stat I saw from Gartner that said that,
well, first of all, let me just paint the picture.
In my previous roles, I would go in and I would
talk to clients and tell them that the first
page of google results that is your corporate
home page you can have all the fancy branding
and copywriting all you want but people are going
to search your company they're going to search
your executives names etc and then whatever pops
up in that first 10 results on the first page
of google is going to heavily influence what
they believe about your brand and the last stats
i saw something around in the neighborhood of
93 or 94 percent of audiences believe what they
find in google search results right okay so that
was sort of then that was the lay of the land
that we've been operating under probably for
the last 20 years or so now as we all know a
lot of us are starting to put those same types
of queries into ai into directly into llms and
get the results out they don't give you 10 results
they give you one answer right and even with
google a lot of times our searches end with the
the AI answer, the AI mode answer at the very
top, and then you'll see the 10 results at the
bottom. And I've seen anywhere from around up
to 40 % of the time, people will look at the
answer that's provided in AI mode and not even
look at the rest of the results at the bottom.
So it's really becoming an important driver in
terms of driving reputation. And then on top
of that, I started to mention the Gartner research.
Gartner predicts that by 2026, search volume
will have declined by about 25%. Okay. So that's
massive because now we're going to see a much,
much larger number of people relying on that
single answer. So that really raises the bar
para for what you mentioned. It's got to be right.
We've got to make sure that we get how our brand
needs to be represented well into these LLMs.
And that's a challenge because they all kind
of. uh work a little bit differently and they
all are trained on different information and
new sources right uh for instance uh you may
get a great hit about your company in the new
york times well guess what they're they're currently
in litigation with llms like chat gpt and so
they're not allowing those tools to scrape their
content it's important Right. It's, it's so,
so what shows up in these LLMs in some part will
be influenced by who's allowing that information
to be ingested. And you know, what's an interesting
thing that I think is I used to never recommend
that people like just apply for lists or awards
or whatever, because just to do it, like, that's
just a checkbox. There's no outcome. Like, what
does that get you? Now I'm like, do it. If you
can get on a list, because if somebody is asking
what's the best, blah, blah, blah. It is going
to pull from some random list. Even if that list
is bullshit, it's going to show up. So like,
it may not be important to you for X, Y, or Z
outcome or selling more, whatever. But if it's
the thing that's going to show up in the LLM,
that is a massive value. So like, maybe we can't
like just thumb our nose at these lower quality
listicles anymore that I don't know. I used to
often just tell people, let's not spend our time
on that kind of crap. And let's try to actually
focus on getting our message out. But now sometimes
it's like, Maybe you do just want to be mentioned
alongside other things. I feel like anywhere
you can pollinate your brand's message, you pollinate.
Like that's, that's the new organic sources.
Yes. Correct. Yes. I agree. And it's such a different
thing than PR used to. Well, then strategic PR
people used to like, we, it used to be very like,
let's take a targeted approach. We're doing X
to achieve Y outcome. Now it's kind of like.
spray and pray is back baby let's get it all
over the place yeah we have we have um prospects
calling us specifically now i mean like directly
for this for the expressed reason of getting
cited in llms when people are searching like
i would say probably 20 to 30 percent of the
inbound we get is they lead with that like we
understand search is waning we understand the
ascent of llms how do we best position ourselves
now to get ahead of the competition Full stop.
And so that's how we're beginning our kind of
thing. Like a spray and pray offering. That's
like, it's not even quality media we're going
for. We're just going for hits. Would you like
a fire hose special? Because that's for sale
today. Gatling gun, right? Listen, it's the wild,
wild west. So it's not a bad analogy. You know,
and I think you kind of touched on it. The old
is new again. uh blogs uh blogs are now you know
involved because newsletters newsletters right
yeah um even reddit i mean uh open ai did a big
uh deal with reddit and it's it's that content
those conversations are helping train the model
and so you know we might start seeing amas back
in vogue right they are they are back in vogue
i've been invited to do reddit amas lately and
i'm like what What? Written AMAs? Cool. I did
an AMA on Reddit. I was asked to do it for the
public relations, you know, channel basically.
And I did that about a year and a half ago. But
the Reddit thing is so interesting to me because
anybody who spent any time there knows that their
bullshit detectors are like all over the place.
Like you can't go there as a marketer and like
talk about how awesome you are and expect not
to get skewered. Only adding value. Yeah. Oh,
yeah, exactly. So so but everybody now knows
that Reddit is instrumental in delivering those
answers. And so everybody's trying to infiltrate
Reddit. And boy, oh, boy, is a war shaping up
between people preserving the integrity of Reddit
and the marketers who want to infiltrate it.
And it's just a really interesting time. It is
interesting. Super interesting. It really is.
You know, and I would also say, you know, so
it's interesting, I think, to pay attention to
those media deals. You know, for instance, another
one with OpenAI has been very aggressive. They've
done a media deal with Axios. And I think that
the centerpiece of that deal is they're going
to be doing, starting at least with local content
and for markets, for trial markets to start.
I think that that's really important is to research
and figure out where those LLMs are getting their
news, where they have those deals, and bake that
into your media strategy. Can I ask a question
about how you see young talent in the comm space
and PR space right now? Because I know that there's
been some studies that show there's something
like, I don't know, the first two or three years.
Typically, when students are out of college,
those jobs that they would have are kind of being
erased by AI across various industries. I'm hearing
that all the time. But when I look at what's
actually happening at my agency and what you've
described as the things you've been using AI
for, those don't really sound like super junior
tasks. In fact, the slide presentation stuff,
the... you know all the things you mentioned
seem more like at least middle management to
senior management type tasks so are you fearful
or up or optimistic about the young folks considering
getting into comms or getting into pr against
the backdrop of what you've seen and done in
the ai space Well, I think it's a mistake. I
know that there are agencies who have said that
part of how they're planning their roadmap with
AI is to reduce their reliance on junior staff.
And I think that's a mistake. And I'll just be
completely honest. I never thought that we in
the comms industry knew how to deploy. junior
staff in the first place. It never made sense
to me, guys, that we'd have these armies of young
people that you recruit out of the best colleges
and universities in the country, and you say,
great. uh get up at 5 00 a .m and start with
media clips and all this kind of stuff i just
thought that there's a better way to analyze
media than that you know i didn't come up in
pr i came up in marketing and advertising and
i learned how to analyze media coverage without
having to go through that process so i know it's
possible um and then you know You guys have been
around this business for a long time. We've also
gotten in the bad habit of making them pseudo
assistants and having them take notes during
calls and things like that. You don't even get
to speak until you've gotten a couple of stripes
on your shoulder. So I don't think we ever really
knew how to deploy our young talent in the first
place. It's a whole separate conversation about
us not knowing how to deploy senior talent either.
But I think give them... Give them meatier things
to do. Yes, take some of those rote tasks off
their plate. Use AI to accelerate the process
of media coverage. But how about have them start
doing analysis, right? It's never too early to
train their brains to be able to be good media
analysts, right? What are you seeing? What are
the threads? What are the through lines? What
do you think is the implication? That's what
clients want. They could get the clips themselves,
right? They want to know what to do with them.
Now AI makes it so you don't have to do any clipping.
You just have the data. What are you going to
do with the data? And I think now you could come
straight out of college and start using LLMs
and be the one who is analyzing data because
they are they. We are trained how to do that
in college. We are trained how to look at information
and come up with conclusions based on that information.
So to your point, it's not like you just have
to do. bitch work in order to learn how to do
pr it's like apply what you already know to the
tools that we have available to us now and then
learn as you go for all of the other stuff for
sure i actually think like unless we start looking
like creating new kind of opportunities for this
just out of school generation it's going to be
really weird for a few years because We're just
expecting people to go into the same roles that
existed before, even though those roles are going
away. But there is still a need for people to
utilize said new tools and manage those. And
that shouldn't necessarily fall on the CMO or
the director of comms or whatever, because their
time might be better spent elsewhere. Why are
we not saying, hey, this is a perfect role for
the 21 -year -old straight out of college? I
don't know. But this is a great point. Absolutely.
You know, and I think also that we need more
talent. I mean, the industry is going through
and is just at the very beginnings of a massive
transformation. None of us knows what it's going
to look like on the other side. We're going to
need all the brainpower we can throw at this.
So it's almost like the Lakers saying, hey, we're
not going to. take the best prospects out of
college anymore we're just going to use veterans
right um it just doesn't make any sense these
are your young these are your future leaders
and your future stars so like i think that there's
something like there is something to understanding
how to brand people companies whatever you have
to understand like generational nuance and like
40 year olds and 20 year olds are from two different
planets in a lot of ways right now, you know?
And so you need to have 40 year olds, 20 year
olds, 58 year olds, all working under the same
roof in order to be able to like hit the cultural
nuance and understand the things that matter
to people these days, because everyone's attention
is so fragmented. It's just not as easy as it
was before to be like, here's a swath of people
that I'm trying to target because. that swath
that you're trying to target now exists in a
thousand different places than they used to before
well you know what's interesting becca about
that so um the digital native piece i totally
agree with and and they would be best equipped
you would think to embrace this new technology
and and quickly you know grok how to install
it and everything they do grok no pun intended
um but but there's kind of an existential battle
isn't there between colleges who are sort of
anti -AI in a sense, wanting kids to prove out
and use their own thinking and not relying too
heavily upon AI to get their education and get
their answers. And yet the real world is demanding
they do just that. Like the real world is screaming
and crying for talent coming out of college who
already has a baseline understanding of all these
tools. So I don't know how you rectify that without.
Having a broader, you know, sort of educational
campaign saying these colleges need to embrace
AI, lean the hell into it and educate the living
shit out of kids that are about to enter the
workforce. Because otherwise there's going to
be a two or three year delta between when they
get out of school and when they get hired. Wasn't
that the same though for like dot com time? Like
everybody's saying like these kids are leaving
college and they have no idea how to like. The
reason why everyone was dropping out of college
because college wasn't teaching them how to do
the stuff in order to create the next big company
using code or go work at a startup being a coder
because colleges weren't doing it. Colleges are
10 years behind and I'm all about higher education.
Don't get me wrong. But it is a miss when AI
is clearly the revolutionary technology right
now and colleges are just spending all their
time trying to figure out how to... moderate
it which yes they do have to do that but they
also have to figure out how to teach it from
an ethics perspective from a like a use just
practical use perspective it's like being 1997
and like saying you guys cannot use google for
your assignments no internet for you library
and only do that there and it's like yeah no
you need you colleges need to get go find some
ai experts to come and teach some courses so
that you guys can get up to speed with the times
you kids can use encyclopedias and microfiche
and that's it that's it oh my goodness boy they
got a whole bunch of gen z -ers like what is
googling microfiche um you're no you're 100 right
i don't know how you justify charging what could
be you know 250 000 for a four -year education
and have that kid graduate knowing nothing about
ai in 2025 it's almost criminal um but i think
that we've seen just as you guys have mentioned
we've seen these patterns repeat themselves where
universities are way behind and it takes some
time to catch up. It happened with myself. I
mean, like I said, you know, I was a graphic
design major. I went to art school. I'm a little
bit older than I look. And so, you know, when
I graduated, it was right at the beginning of
the desktop publishing revolution. Problem, I
learned how to do all the graphic design stuff
in college with the old school T -square and
triangle and flexible curve and all that stuff
they don't use today. And when I graduated, effectively,
my degree was obsolete. My first job interview,
they asked, do you know how to use a computer?
And I lied. And I said, yeah, I do. And I figured,
well, I know more than they do. And I'll just
figure it out. And I figured it out. And I taught
myself. So I think that we're almost kind of
in a similar inflection point. But back then,
they wouldn't let us use computers in our program
in college, just like they're not letting people
use AI today. Now, eventually, they came around.
And eventually, they'll come around in universities
today. But you're right. I think that we have
to think about new ways to challenge students.
If they can use ChatGPT or Claude to create a
paper, great. How about have them do a mock debate,
right? How about take them and say, all right,
well, the paper that you created, go over there
and take your colleague who knows nothing about
this topic and teach them about it, right? Show
how much they understand. Or how about this?
Show me your prompts. right let me see how creative
and how intricate your prompts were to generate
this paper and i'll grade you on that i think
that there's so much we could be doing rather
than wringing our hands that they're using it
to cheat they've always been cheating right if
you want to cheat you've always done it the teachers
need to evolve too it is really up it's like
it's both things because there's new tools like
okay people used to use a hammer and now we have
a plug -in that you can use to break up the concrete
you know they shouldn't have to just keep using
the hammer because the teacher only knows how
to use the hammer and i just like it boggles
the mind i think what you said before and this
is always my number one piece of advice i give
to anybody who asks like what advice would you
give me it's to be the i'll figure it out person
because especially during these times of transition
Nobody knows what the hell they're doing. We
are all just trying to figure it out. And if
you have the drive to figure it out and raise
your hand and be like I don't really know how
to do that, but I'm sure I can figure it out.
Go figure it out. And that's how you learn how
to do it better, right? You learned AI by playing
with AI. You didn't go to a class and say, hey,
teach me how to do this so that I can go teach
other people. You literally started just consuming
information and tinkering with it and talking
to people and blah, blah, blah. And that is really
where we're at right now with AI. And the more
you can just trial and error and figure things
out. you will be light years ahead of your peers.
Even if you don't have anybody come and train
you how to do it, just start watching YouTube
videos or reaching out to people who do know
how to do things and like tinker, tinker, tinker,
because that is really the thing that's going
to, I think, win the day right now and make you
way more marketable in your next job. And you
can even ask AI to teach you how to use it. Exactly.
Exactly. And just kind of pivot a little bit.
All the organizations I see, the CEOs are talking
about like, we need to reduce headcount because
like, it's almost like a badge of honor to have
reduced headcount right now. Like they are super
psyched to report to their shareholders, like
we've reduced headcount, our profits are up.
But yet against that backdrop, I'm hearing about
a lot of leaders hiring back people of the roles
they eliminated to your earliest point, Chris,
about you think it's a mistake letting off. letting
go of the youngest folks. Where do you see it
shaken out in corporate America writ large as
it relates to CEOs being compensated for reducing
headcount and being glorified leaders because
they've become so efficient and the reality on
the ground that you need human beings to actually
interact with these tools to bring out the best
of what it's got? How do you see this playing
out in the next five years? Well, I think that
There have been somewhere I've read that somewhere
in the neighborhood of like two trillion dollars
worth of money invested in AI over the past couple
of years or so. So I think a lot of investors,
first of all, I think there's been a lot of overpromising
and sort of outlandish expectations about what
those efficiency gains would look like and how
quickly they would happen. And in a lot of cases,
the investors are saying, look. You spent all
this money. We need to start seeing some cost
savings and we need to start seeing some returns.
So I think that there are going to be a number
of executives, CEOs who are going to feel pressured
to cut costs. So I think we're going to keep
seeing that because in some cases they're going
to have to do it. If for no other reason, just
to have a Klarna type moment, like, look, we
tried it. That didn't work out very well. Now
we got to start bringing people back. Similar
type of thing with Duolingo. I think we're probably
going to see some of that because I think some
of them just feel kind of boxed in. But I think
a lot of this is due to a lot of these predictions.
And again, we've seen this, we saw it with the
dot -com boom as well. Retail or brick and mortar
is going to go away. You're never going to go
to a store again. Well, how'd that work? So I
think that people saying, hey, we're going to
have all these capabilities within the next six
months or 12 months or so, set up unrealistic
expectations and we're kind of paying for that.
I think realistically, I always say co -pilot,
not autopilot. The ideal pairing is humans and
AI working together. And ultimately, whether
they have to learn it the hard way or the easy
way, I hope they learn it the easy way, I think
companies are going to figure that out. What's
so interesting is I hear so very little about
companies investing in... upskilling their workforce
for this so very little and i mean this is what
you do for a living so people are hiring you
to come in and upskill their workforce but like
the conversation is let's cut people Or let's
hire people who know how to do AI stuff so that
we can do AI stuff here. And there's no conversation
about let's give time to our employees so that
they can go tinker with AI. And let's give them
X number of hours a day to go learn this or have
somebody come in and teach them or help them
build an agent or whatever. It comes down to
people really needing to go out and do it themselves.
And so if you do want to have a workforce who
is going to multiply, apply what they're doing
right now by using AI, then freaking teach them
how to do it, right? Give them permission to
go try and fail and waste time on a project that
might lead to nowhere because that's how they're
going to learn how to do it. And you're never
going to be able to have an AI workforce that
is productive. using AI if you don't teach people
how to use it? And that I don't understand. Like,
where is the conversation around upskilling rather
than just like - No, that reminds me of the old
CFO saw, which is, well, what happens if we spend
all this money training all these people and
they leave? And then they leave. Yeah. And then
somebody's like, well, what if we don't train
these people and they fucking stay? That's right.
That's kind of where we're at. You're right.
Well, it's incredibly short -sighted. It's the
first place, unfortunately, in our business culture,
which has been this way for the past 40 years.
It's the first place we go, right? Cut costs
and costs are us, right? People. But you're 100
% right, Becca. The companies that are going
to endure, like, you know, if we could transport
10 years into the future. The strongest, best
performing companies are going to be companies
that have more people who understand how to use
AI, not fewer people using AI. So I think that
upskilling really needs that. We've got to think
about that again. And it wasn't that long ago
that that training, corporate training, et cetera,
was the norm in corporate America. But I think,
you know, I don't know, my theory is somewhere
around. the Great Recession, you know, 2008,
2009, a lot of those budgets got cut and they
just never came back. But I think we're going
to have to really dust that off because, you
know, you can... you're going to have to have
a lot of training. You can come in and you can
hire someone like me, please do. But I think
you can't just take one bite at the apple. It's
a continuous thing. No one can take one golf
lesson and think that they know how to play golf
or one French lesson and think they know how
to speak French fluently. You've got to keep
doing it. You've got to keep training. And I
think companies are going to have to continue
to invest in training, even for people who know
how to use AI, because it's a moving target.
Totally. I mean, I felt like a year ago I was
on top of it. And now I just always feel like
I'm behind because like, it really is a matter
of like, how many hours in the week do you have
to spend on learning the new things or understanding
the new models or whatever, whatever, because
there is constantly something new, constantly
a new way to add value, but like it takes time,
right? You have to go devote time to learning
it, tinkering with it, refining it. Like it's
not just a snappy, easy. you know i think the
permission piece um organizationally like internally
like if we if our ethos is like we are going
to get smart we're going to do what it takes
to to learn uh as best we can as these things
morph and change i think that's the winning strategy
like i'm trying to incorporate that with So we
have a dedicated channel on Slack that is all
about AI learnings, use cases, where everybody
has just constantly got this little laboratory
of things they're trying. And they tried to upload
this file into that. And this is the format,
just constantly sharing what we're learning,
iterating and tweaking. But it's got to be blessed
at the highest levels of the organization to
let people experiment, to Becca's point, and
have that time and space and grace and latitude
to learn as they fly. companies don't have the
patience or the time unless there's a measurable
outcome or output. Sound familiar, PR and comms?
Associated with that. So I think that's another
problem we have to solve. How do you give soft
time to people that you can't directly measure
the outcome? How do you do that organizationally
and have the key stakeholders bless that? We're
in that transition right now. And on the note
of transition. I'm going to transition us to
our ending questions because they're my favorite
part of the show because they show everybody's
personality. Although we will not be asking our
old question of, would you rather have the hiccups
for three months or cut your finger off? Because
we've asked that 10 times now. And it's good
every time. Wait, but wait, what is your answer
to that one quickly? Would you rather have hiccups
for three months or cut off your pinky? Oh, man.
I mean, I'd have to go with the hiccups. I rely
way too much on my pinkies. I'm attached to them.
There it is. Okay, so first we'll go with the
normal ones, and then I'm going to let Perry
go with an unhinged question for you. And I don't
even know what Perry's unhinged questions are,
but I also have some unhinged questions if you
want to do this. Okay. You get to erase one corporate
buzzword from existence. What is it? Low -hanging
fruit. Love it. Agreed. You're about to give
a presentation in front of 50 ,000 screaming
fans. What is your walkout song or walk -up song?
My walk -up song? I would say Public Announcement
by Jay -Z. Allow me to reintroduce myself. I
like that. That's a good one for sure. Okay,
if you had to do a TED Talk on anything but AI,
communications, marketing, what would your topic
be? I would say the need for better leadership
in corporate America. Ooh, I would watch that
and agree, probably wholeheartedly. And you get
to use one emoji only for the rest of your life.
Which emoji? Oh man, that's a tough one. I like
my emojis. It would have to be the sort of flexing
arm emoji. Yeah, I use that a lot. Yeah, that
means that things are good. Yeah, most of my
friends should grin. Love it. Solid. Perry, do
you have an unhinged question for Chris? It's
not quite as unhinged as cutting off one's pinky
or being eaten by a shark, but... You have a
choice, Chris. You can be given $20 million free
and easy today to use as you see fit for the
remainder of your days. The problem with that
is you can never sleep in the same dwelling two
nights in a row for the rest of your life. And
it can't be two houses you buy next door. You
just go next door. It's got to be vastly different
locations. Do you take the money? And say, screw
it, I'll just fly all over the world and sleep
wherever the hell I want. Or is routine, structure,
normalcy more important than that $20 million
cash infusion that would undeniably change your
life for the remainder of your days? Man, everybody's
going to say. That's a hard one. That's a hard
one because I love my bed. Everybody's going
to say, this guy's insane. He's going to say
no to $20 million, but no. I am a creature of
habit and structure, and I would much, much rather
have my routine and my friends and my bed and
all that stuff. I'm with you, Chris. This is
the first time we've ever all agreed on something.
I 100 % would also not take the money. What am
I going to do? I have a wife and kids. What am
I going to do? See you in a couple days. I just
value my sleep too much. I would hate the idea
of waking up one day and being so tired and just
wanting to get in my bed later that night and
being like, where the fuck am I? Am I sleeping
tonight? I don't even know. I got to get there.
This sucks. I bet if we ask this question a few
more times to some guests, some people will be
like, you know what? I'm taking the goddamn money.
Careful what you ask for. Chris, I want to give
you an opportunity to share anything with our
audience that you would like to share, how they
can find you, any parting words, whatever you
want to leave us with. Yeah, parting words. I
just want to echo what you said. I mean, you
know, I tell people all the time when they say
they're not an expert, they don't know anything
about this stuff. I say, well, play around with
it a bit and wait six months, right? So this
is evolving. We're on the ground floor of this
amazing technology. Please jump in. We need all
the brains we can get. So that's the first thing.
Where they can find me, you know. Not as much
as you guys, but I try to maintain a presence
on LinkedIn. So you can find me there. And also
my website, chrisg .me, where I blog semi -regularly
and have a newsletter where I do a prompt of
the week every Saturday. Ooh, that's a good one.
I didn't know that. Well, this has been... Very
enlightening, very fun. And I love this topic.
So Chris, I will continue to be in touch with
you and hope to learn more from you in the future.
And everyone go visit Chris G's website and connect
with him on LinkedIn. And we'll see you all next
time. Thank you. Appreciate the discussion. Thank
you, buddy. Thanks for having me.