Before you touch the technology, you have to answer one question.Why would I use this?Not as a policy. Not as a business case. As a person.That is the question Erica Farmer, this week’s guest, puts at the centre of every AI transformation conversation she has. And it is the question most organisations skip entirely.Erica is founder of QuantumRise, a keynote speaker and futurist on people-first AI, and the author of the newly published AI for People Professionals. She has spent her career working with HR and L&D leaders inside large, complex organisations, and she is clear on what the evidence tells us:

AI adoption fails when it treats people as users rather than as people.

Her phrase for the fix is the AI dividend.Not ROI. Not productivity gain. The personal, specific, meaningful thing that makes someone want to show up differently because of AI. For Erica, who has fibromyalgia, it is the ability to run two businesses without burning out. For someone else it could be the headspace to do the work that actually matters. Get that right and engagement follows. Miss it and you just have an email strategy with “AI” in the subject line.

We also get into the question of who drives transformation in an organisation. Erica's answer is not top-down alone and not grassroots alone. It is both at once.

The top layer and the frontline both need to become AI literate first. Then the management middle layer is what makes it real, supercharging change through coaching, enablement and support.

Not as a bolt-on. Not as an email recipient. As the people who activate everything the organisation has invested in above and below them.**Have you found your AI dividend yet? And have you helped the people around you find theirs?**The article follows later in the week, the resource is obviously, Erica’s book - here’s the link if you haven’t purchased it already AI for People Professionals .

A solo audio walk through would be overkill this week so it just remains for me to invite you to join me next week for some AI reflection when I will be asking questions like: ‘what have we learned from the guests who have shared their insights from the real world?’ ‘Have they helped us tackle AI more boldly?’ and ‘What have they said that made us think harder about our relationship with AI? Until then, thank you for listening, watching and engaging - you make it all worthwhile. Take care and stay Sovereign.

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