Quick note, as you might be wondering why this week's issue didn't show up in your inbox on Tuesday as it regularly does. Well, the easy answer is that I'm human and I have not handed over my newsletter to AI.

The longer version is that while I carve out time each weekend for my Anchored in Possibility work including the Change Anchor, this past weekend as my youngest is turning 12 and my oldest has just moved out of the house, I made the conscious choice to prioritize family time first.   

Today, as I'm writing this on Tuesday, I was listening to an episode of Smashing Security, a cybersecurity podcast I’ve recently come across. They were talking about some of the ways AI is changing the threat landscape, what AI has gotten remarkably good at, and the things we now need to think about to protect ourselves.

It was a fantastic episode (and no I’m not getting paid to say that). It was practical, interesting and genuinely useful and somewhere in the middle of listening to it, I had this very clear thought..

Oh shit. I can’t believe we’re here already. 

I wasn’t thinking that because what they were describing was science fiction but quite the opposite. I understand enough about what AI can already do to recognize how plausible it all was, how both good and bad actors are exploiting AI in ways we’re only just starting to understand and how fast the landscape is changing.

And immediately I thought about my family.

My 83-year-old mother. My 13-year-old daughter. My 12-year-old son.

I understand enough about AI, cybersecurity and social engineering to know when something deserves a second look. I know to pause and to validate first. To question whether the person, message or request in front of me is actually what it appears to be.

They don’t have anywhere near the same level of understanding as I do. 

Which means I need to think differently about how I help protect them and I’ll share more about that in an upcoming issue. 

But there it was again. This strange contradiction I keep experiencing with AI.

I genuinely love what it makes possible. I use it every day and I’m constantly learning, experimenting with it, pushing it and get annoyed with it. I start over, switch tools and models and occasionally stare at something AI produced in 30 seconds that would have taken me two hours just to read about, let alone think through and organize my thoughts about.

It has made some previously painful parts of my work and personal life dramatically easier and I find that amazing.

And at the same time, the more I understand about what these tools can do, the harder it is to ignore what else comes with that capability.

It’s not lost on me that those two things can and do exist at the same time.

I read a Gallup study recently that made this tension even more interesting. They found that people who use AI frequently were more than twice as likely as less-frequent users to fear that their jobs could be eliminated by technology.

At first, that sounds backwards.

You might expect the people using AI most often to feel the most confident about the future because they understand it better.

But understanding isn’t always the same thing as reassurance.

Once you use AI enough, it stops being some abstract future technology. You know what it can do because you’ve watched it do parts of your own work. You’ve gave it instructions, got up left the room, went to pickup your kids only to return home to your AI assistant handing over the finished draft or outcome of the task waiting for review. You’ve seen how quickly the capabilities are improving. You start noticing implications you probably wouldn’t have considered before.

Sometimes no matter how much you know, that knowledge doesn’t make uncertainty disappear.

It simply makes the uncertainty more informed.

I would say that’s where I am right now. 

Even in my role as a leader at a AI-first tech company, I too am caught in this juxtaposition. 

I am incredibly optimistic about what AI makes possible. I also have legitimate concerns about what happens as these capabilities become more powerful and widespread.

I will tell you that I don’t think I need to resolve that contradiction.

In fact, I’m starting to think holding both may be a more useful position than forcing myself into one camp or the other.

I can be excited and concerned at the same time.

Curious and cautious.

Optimistic about what becomes possible and thoughtful about what those possibilities require from us.

The important question isn’t which side we choose.

It’s what we do with what we know.

Your Anchor for this week

Pay attention to where you may be trying to force yourself into a position about AI.

Instead, ask yourself:

What am I genuinely excited about? What genuinely concerns me? And what do I want to do with what I now know?

You don’t have to resolve the tension before you decide to do something with it. Sometimes having an understanding of the tension is what helps you decide how you want to move forward.

🩵 What I’m loving

Smashing Security Podcast

Cybersecurity is increasingly becoming one of those subjects I feel like we need to understand, whether we particularly want to or not.

What I appreciate about the podcast is that it manages to make genuinely alarming topics entertaining and accessible enough that I keep listening instead of sticking my fingers in my ears and pretending none of this is happening.

Today’s episode clearly gave me plenty to think about and I hope it will do the same for you. Listen here.  

Remember, you’re still the author of what comes next.

Warmly,
Heather

Anchored in Possibility™ | The future belongs to those who know who they are when everything changes.