Leadership is being redefined in the age of social media and AI. This episode explores how these forces are accelerating the shift from command-and-control leadership to one rooted in authenticity and trust. Charlene Li, New York Times best-selling author and CEO of Quantum Networks Group, offers practical insights into: - How to create followership and lead movements with authenticity. - The risks and rewards of maintaining an online presence as a leader. - Strategies for balancing personal boundaries with digital visibility.
Leadership is being redefined in the age of social media and AI. This episode explores how these forces are accelerating the shift from command-and-control leadership to one rooted in authenticity and trust. Charlene Li, New York Times best-selling author and CEO of Quantum Networks Group, offers practical insights into:
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[00:00:00]
Jerry: I'm Jerry Won. Welcome to Tomorrowist, where we explore the trend shaping the future of work in the world where visibility is currency. Today's leaders face a tough paradox. How do you build a strong digital presence without compromising your privacy or your peace of mind? The pressure to have a strong digital presence and to be constantly on.
Collides with growing risks like doxing and DeepFakes. The risk of AI generated impersonation also raises new questions about trust, identity, and authenticity. Here to help us unpack how leadership is evolving in this digital age of [00:01:00] Charlene Li, New York Times bestselling author and founder, and CEO of Quantum Networks Group.
Charlene, welcome to Tomorrowist.
Charlene: Thank you for having me.
Jerry: I am so excited to have this conversation. I, I live on LinkedIn. I know you do as well, and, and you've spent quite a bit of time as many other people have about building your reputation, your personal brand, your persona on the internet. And so as we, I. Evolving and we're not entering.
We are entering new chapters of new technological advances and particularly AI and how we consume and create content. Uh, really excited to, uh, learn from you and I know that our audience is, uh, excited as well. Um, you, you've said in your book, in other works, uh, disruptive times, call for bold leadership, uh, in today's digital landscape, what defines a bold leader and how has that shifted even in the last five years?
Charlene: Yeah, I, I think if, if you think what traditional leadership has been, it's been, uh, very command and control, very process oriented, uh, very focused [00:02:00] on a charismatic personal leadership style. And, and, and I think what's been emerging over the, definitely over the last five years, but even over the past 10 or 15, it's something that's much more around.
Uh, servant leadership, being authentic, being creative, um, and it, it's much more around this emotional intelligence. Around building trust. I like to say that leadership is a relationship do between people who aspire to create change and people who are inspired to follow them. And that has been true for, for, for eons.
So instead of hierarchy, we're thinking about distributed leadership. And focusing on speed and innovation because the pace of change is outpacing, uh, our ability to understand it and grasp it. It's moving from control and command to agility and trust and tapping into people's agency. And I think it's, it's, it's, instead of charisma, we're thinking about connection and empathy.
So the, I think the problem with, with, with now [00:03:00] is that there are so many problems. We need leaders not defined by title, but by the desire to create change, to step into that void and to create clarity, uh, when there is none, and they create it by acting.
Jerry: You know, I, I think about the visual. Um, I think we've seen this cartoon where the traditional model of leadership is a person in the front of the pack just directing traffic or saying, go, right. And this new, and again, the definitions will always evolve, but this new definition is more, I. Uh, somebody either being in the middle with their people or even in the back guiding and, you know, building that.
Just not a command and saying we gotta go. Right. And I think being more online, and we're gonna talk plenty about this, has changed not only our perception of leaders, but our accessibility, uh, how we view them, how they communicate with us more in real time. Maybe not through prescribed. You know, um, letters or highly edited pieces.
And so I, I think this is really fascinating and, you know, uh, the, the speed of change, as with all things is, is quickly ing as well. Um, [00:04:00] you've, you've also argued for creating a follower first strategy. Um, how does, what define that for us, and then how does that apply to digital leadership in today's era of skepticism, surveillance, information overload, all the sort of the dark side of being online, too much.
Charlene: Sure. Yeah. Again, I, I do believe that if you're going to create change, you need movements. And we are not trained as leaders on how to create a movement. And you create a movement by having followers, as I was talking about before, and your followers, your first follower in particular is so important. So instead of leading from the front, how do you support your followers who have made this courageous decision to follow your crack pop ideas?
You're, you're saying we can change the world. They're believing you. So this again, comes from the power of not saying we're gonna go here in a personal charisma, but the power comes from somebody saying, I am with you. I am going to follow with you and they take all of their social capital, all of [00:05:00] their equity and stick it behind you, and that's a tremendous amount of responsibility you have to support them.
So you are not the hero. Your followers are. That's a follower first, it's about creating followership and doing everything possible to say We're united in our purpose, and I am as your leader, I'm gonna get rid of all the obstacles. My job is to make sure you have the resources to do the, the work, and to make sure the obstacles are taken away and to just create that container.
So that you can practice your agency. So it's, it's a very different approach to, again, leading from the front, our traditional way of thinking about leaders to not even necessarily leaving from leading from behind, but it's a different supportive way, and it requires vulnerability, requires transparency, and most importantly, trust.
Jerry: You know, leaders today are, are, you know, we're not even expected to. Right? The, the expectation is now there, uh, [00:06:00] to be highly visible. Both online and off. Um, the pandemic and our being online more even for professional, especially for professional reasons, has changed our paradigm of what our expectations or, you know, platforms like X and Instagram and TikTok and LinkedIn, uh, create this frictionless methodology and opportunity for leaders, brands, anybody to be literally in our pockets 24 7.
And, and that's created now this expectation that, uh, even though. We're owed nothing. We have this expectation that leaders be visible. Um, how do you advise executives and, and your clients to balance building up that presence, uh, while maintaining personal boundaries?
Charlene: The thing I hear from people a lot is, well, you know, I wanna keep my business and my personal separate from each other, but business is personal. It is about that relationship. So I'm not talking about, I, I don't wanna know about your vacation. I, I do not want to know. It's just not helpful to me. But I [00:07:00] wanna know what drives you.
I understand how you're being moved by the things that are around you. I wanna hear how work is bringing you joy and how it could also bring me joy. So that's about being authentic to who you are, and I see your online presence as simply an extension of your leadership that you practice every single day.
It should feel authentic, it should feel, uh, frictionless. Granted, there's friction in creating content. There always is. The expression of your ideas should be frictionless. So I really say share your values, don't share your vacation. So it's really about what's important to you.
Jerry: And I think, you know, the common sense prevails here too, right? So, you know, um, I know folks don't post live where they are, right? Sometimes maybe they'll post after they've left the location. Obviously people have different thoughts on sharing about their families, particularly children. Um, and so, you know, even though we are expected to be [00:08:00] visible, I think there is a.
Subtle difference or a notable difference between being transparent and being a hundred percent out there versus also finding your boundaries on, on, you know, protecting your family and then sort of your, your, your own sanity sometimes as well. Um, you, you've got a strong brand. That's a understatement.
Um, just before this recording, I checked and you're at about 200 and seventies. 277,000 followers on LinkedIn, a big, big deal, which means that people find your content and your voice, uh, not only relatable but resonant and, and have followed you as a result of that. Um, what have you learned about the risks and reward of being findable online?
Um, being present, you know, uh, people see you in different places, both on and offline.
Charlene: Well, I think being visible builds credibility. And also trust it. It because you're there, out there constantly. You're putting yourself out there, you're being vulnerable and you, you are saying and practicing the things that you actually are. Uh, but it also opens you up to criticism [00:09:00] and scrutiny. So not everyone is going to agree with me and in my leadership capacity, it's the same case.
I, believe that leaders have responsibility for making people a bit uncomfortable. And if you're not making people uncomfortable, then you're probably not leading courageously enough. So what I try to do with every bit of content is to be very intentional about it. How is it creating value? How am I supporting my audience?
And every post, every comment is a reflection of that impact that I want to have. I have never written a post to try to get more followers. I've never created an article thinking, oh, this is gonna get me a lot more engagement if it's, it's out there and I hear from people, that was super helpful. That makes my day.
So the reward for me is connection and influence. The risk is being misunderstood. I'm happy to take that risk because then I enter into a dialogue and we can [00:10:00] correct that misconception, that misunderstanding. Uh, but I think that the cost of inaction has a significant one, and that is irrelevance. And I think what we want to be as leaders is to be relevant and we want to have that impact in the world.
Jerry: And I think people forget, and I think, you know, we are, we also live in a world of, you know, hacks or I want this done tomorrow. And sometimes people either willfully or unknowingly, uh, forget to remember that somebody like you. That following came years of consistent posting, delivering value, putting content into the universe.
I mean, your New York Times bestselling book has been out there for almost 15 years. Right? And so this is. Almost a decade plus of work, um, for, for maybe some of our younger audiences. LinkedIn's been around for about 20 years, right? So it, it is, uh, not a new platform, although folks are, uh, discovering it.
Um, but the ways that we use it have changed as well, right? And so, frankly, when it was initially introduced, uh, more [00:11:00] of a virtual resume, and now it's a full fledged content platform, uh, with a lot of different tentacles on, on how you can engage with it, um, more so, so that now people. Leaders are now, like you mentioned, uh, that line no longer exists between what we consider professional content and personal content, uh, because the leadership lessons can be, you know, uh, shared from both parts of our lives.
And so how do you see that line between personal and professional identity, uh, personified through content shifting for our leaders, especially when every post livestream comment can go viral. There are people. Screen capturing every tweet that anybody makes just in case they delete it. Um, you get quoted now, people are being, uh, commonly quoted for something they said on a podcast that may not be popular.
And so every word that we say is truly forever on the internet. How do you, how do you see that line and how are you advising your clients to juggle between that line that no longer exists?
Charlene: Uh, again, I think the lines have blurred. [00:12:00] I, I'll give you an example. I, when I started blogging 21 years ago, in 2004, I had really young kids and I would talk, 'cause parenting was a big part of my life. So I would talk about the adventures of parenting and what that informed me about disruption and leadership.
But I would never use my kids' names. And what I withdrawn is the lessons. What did it bring up for me? And, and in our day-to-day work, we talk about personal things, about things that we learn from our experiences, but we put them into the context of the conversation at that moment. So I will talk about these things, but in the context of what will help my audience and support my audience, and, and I think that that concern about.
How do we, how do we share too much? Again, this is a gauge. Some people will share a lot. Other people will not share very much at all. I had early on, I realized it was very difficult for me to maintain that context between professional and personal, especially online. [00:13:00] So I decided early on I was not gonna post anything online that was personal.
So you have to go really deeply into my content to really try to find deeply personal things, um, about me and 'cause I just, as a rule, keep my personal life personal. It's tucked away, it's mine and it's that world that I will contain, and I am very comfortable with that. And so if you are, you have, every person has a different level of comfort with that.
And so I do believe though, that it is so important to understand that even when something does go wrong, if you have developed this relationship with your audience, they will give you grace. You're allowed to make mistakes. You're allowed to be human. I've made my share of mistakes along the way, and my audience has given me grace, and I'm incredibly grateful and lucky to have that.
But that comes again from building that credibility, building that relationship, and investing in that in a way that's true and authentic to the way you [00:14:00] live.
Jerry: You know, I, I think you're right. You know, sometimes we often think about the worst case scenario, right? What if something I say something wrong or something I've shared too much and we don't think, because this is how we're, we're wired. Uh, we don't think about the best case scenario, right? What if the story that I share can help somebody really change their life around, see themselves in a position that they haven't other seen, um, particularly, you know, can they see somebody like themselves being in positions on stages and, and making impact in a way and, and really have that be that spark of inspiration?
And so I know, uh, there are so many people. Listening, watching, um, or just in our professional worlds who don't share that are hesitant to share that are, uh, out of fear, out of. I hear this all the time, I'm not that interesting. I don't know what to share or what if I get it wrong or, you know, um, for maybe our corporate friends, you know, what will my company think if I write something that's personal or, you know, uh, even though these lines are blurring, there are people who are, haven't press publish in a very long time.
Um, what, what's the advice [00:15:00] to leaders, whether they be younger in their, earlier in their career journeys or, or later, um, who are hesitant to be visible? Um, and just the, i, I guess through the lens of, uh. Personal branding, almost becoming an expectation that people are expecting to find something about their clients, their colleagues, somebody that they're looking to hire.
Charlene: I think the, the biggest risk is to be irrelevant. Again, as I mentioned before, because if you do not have a social presence, people going, well, what's going on here? Do you, do you not believe in your leadership, do you? I. Uh, what, what are you hiding basically? And the, the other content of this is like, I'm afraid that what I have to say isn't interesting.
You are infinitely interesting as a person. You are unique as a person. And even though it has been said a thousand times before, you haven't said it. I wanna hear it from you, from your perspective. With all the experiences that you bring, there is no way that you are [00:16:00] irrelevant. What you have to say matters.
And I think the opportunity is you have no idea when something you say could impact somebody. I, I, I'm approached by people all the time, just by the presence of being an Asian American woman in the United States to say, thank you for being present. Thank you for being out there. 'cause I remember when I began my career, I could not point to a single role model.
I could not point to a single Asian American women in leadership. I. So I take that responsibility to just be present, to show up and to share what I need to know what I know, because someone, I have no idea who could benefit from it. And the last thing I would say that hitting that publish button, it is an act of courage.
I have been doing this for over 20 years, and my palms still gets get sweat sweaty. And that's when I know it's a really good post, because if I am feeling nervous, feeling a bit vulnerable. Those are my best [00:17:00] posts. I'll check it. I'll like, I'll send it to somebody. I'm like, is this on the edge? And sometimes they're like, yeah, that's too much.
Or they're like, no, no, go for it. So get that validation, get the support, get, get that network going because this is hard. I'm not saying it's easy, it's simple. Push a publish button, right? It is not easy.
Jerry: And I'll add, um, I there's so much to, to, to resonate on what you just said. Right. And I think it's just the, uh, visibility. Somebody who, uh, maybe doesn't know exactly where you've been, but knows better than most. Um, a lot of thought leadership content needs to be, there needs to be more thought leadership content out there in the world from people who've lived, uh, a variety of different experiences so that we can closely, more closely resonate and relate to.
My own life. Right? And so, um, I, I know that to be true from being a consumer of content. I know that from other people. Like you've had that experience of somebody saying, I needed to hear from you. Um, because it, it is really the, the context through which we sometimes [00:18:00] absorb these stories, uh, in addition to the rich content that I think is, is, is really powerful.
Um. And we talked about a little bit, you know, you don't create content to gain followers, but as the world is, uh, we are filled with metrics, um, platforms give us updates on our metrics. Um, and I, I, you know, how do you view that? Is it, is it a indication? Is it just a reflection of the relevance of your posts?
Obviously, when you have as many followers as you do on the LinkedIn platform, the numbers play out. Um. How do you view sort of the success of a post? Um, or do you get dms from folks who may not engage with you publicly for a lot of the reasons that we talked about? Um, how do you judge the success or the importance of the impact of your posts?
Charlene: I, I, I don't wanna say the success of a post. It's about informing me about what content is resonating and why. That's [00:19:00] the importance of my analytics. So I'll take all my analytics and it's not about did I get, you know, more. Again, I look at the numbers overall to see what the trends are, but I'm looking to see why this post really resonated.
I got a lot more viewers. It became, it went viral. I got a lot more comments or shares. Why was that? Really filled an analysis in, into AI and like, what was the commonality between these posts? Look at these things. I, I can't figure it out. So the AI will tell me, uh, and then I'll, I'll write more of it. And it's a constant jiggery.
I have had several pivots in my life. I, I started out looking at the internet, then went to search that email marketing along the way, social media, digital transformation, mobile, and now ai. Those are a lot of pivots and. The, the, the thing that allows me to pivot is a continuity around disruption. So those are my themes around leadership and strategy and technology, but it also is this constant pace of just trying constantly new things.
I. I am with every [00:20:00] single engagement, with every single post. I'm pushing that edge. I'm pushing where I can go with this, and I'm testing the waters to see what works, what resonates is I'm making my best guess out there, but it's a guess and my audience confirms it for me. This is valuable. I'm finding this helpful, and I love the messages that I get back from people.
Uh, people don't reach out enough. If there's anything, I would say as a consumer, reach out to people, replying comments. When people give you an email at the end of the presentation, they want you, believe me, we want you to email us. We're not doing it. Just performatively. I love hearing from, from the audiences because I do want it to be a dialogue and sometimes it feels very much like broadcast, but it really should be a dialogue.
Jerry: So much, uh, re resonance there even for me, Charlene, as we listen to this, um, uh, I wanna take a step aside and talk about some of the, uh, potentially negative or concerning parts about [00:21:00] being online too much. Uh, doxing, Uh, harassment or very real threats.
We've also seen instances of, of physical harm. Um. From, from somebody knowing too much about another person, uh, should, should executive teams include, and if so, what type of, you know, digital risk protection, privacy coaching, um, even security things as a part of their leadership development. Um, what is, what is the right balance there?
Charlene: I, I think, again, part of media training, so to speak, is, is also about how do you have digital safety. So just in the same way you get briefed on brand guidelines or financial controls, it should also be briefed on how to protect your digital identity. I. How to maintain your privacy settings and, and also how to recognize a threat and what to do with it.
And the first time you actually, uh, have, uh, response to, uh, any sort of comms, I think it was like a first responder within the comms to these kinds of threats. The, the first time you do that should not be the first time it actually happens. There should be practice runs [00:22:00] so that you're, you're thinking about these things.
What happens when a deepfake comes along? If you had been authentically and, uh, consistently out there saying your saying the things that you do, it's very difficult for a deepfake to go through. 'cause people are like, great. That's not this person. That's not the person I know. Th th this person would never say these things.
It doesn't align with who they are. And so they would automatically discount it. So it's, it's, those are the things that, the radically different things that are seeking to displace you to, uh, to harm your reputation, just get immediately discounted because it's so obvious. It's not you. The, the harder ones are the attacks.
I've been docs, I've been, um, bullied. Again, all the things that you can imagine have happened and what has happened every single time is my community and my audience has come to me, come to my rescue. They vouch for me. I didn't have to vouch for myself. My audience vouched for me. It's like, [00:23:00] no, she's not that way.
She doesn't do those things. You're putting words in her mouth. So, and these are the ways that you deal with bullies. You don't fight the bully directly. You just basically circle around and like, we're not gonna stand for this. So I keep coming back to the best way, to the best defense is an offense. Get out there, make sure it's full.
Your content, full of content. Your profiles are clear. People can see who you are and they can go and verify this is who this person is. If there's nothing out there, there's nothing they can do, you can do about it. You're starting from scratch. So that's, defense is an offense here.
Jerry: And it goes without saying. For you to have that right, for you to have the community, for you to have, for you to have that, you know, reputation, the personal brand that people know you for, you gotta have a massive body of work out there. Right. You need enough work out there that's been consistent. That's been, uh, not only consistent in messaging, but consistent in timing.
Um, and, and in long term so that people know. Right. And so, um, uh, two years [00:24:00] ago I had, you know, a scammer try to, they take all my pictures from Instagram and created a separate account even with my name. And, you know, that that happens. And, you know, uh, friends joked and been like, wow. Uh. You've made it when somebody tries to impersonate you.
Right? And I, and I said, yeah, you know, but that this still doesn't solve this problem. Um, and, and I hope that you know that I'm not gonna ask you for, you know, your personal information or try to sell you a cryptocurrency or, you know, something online. And like you said, I, I've never done any of that. And so those should raise red flags, uh, for people to say, Hey, this is not what this person that I follow, uh, will, will do.
Um, 'cause also to say you should stay, you know, uh, be known for something. So that if you start to post something that is not your norm, that the audience should know, that your community should know. Um, when, when it comes to leaders within, uh, more of a traditional, uh, corporate space, HR space, and I know some industries are, are more, uh, have, have more guidelines or even laws that, uh, prevent or, you know, that have some restrictions [00:25:00] around content sharing.
Um. What role should the company or HR, uh, play in helping executives frame their or manage their digital footprints? How do we draw, how do you draw that line between, this is my personal account versus I am an extension because I'm an executive, I'm a fiduciary of an organization. Um, both while they're employed at the company and then sort of post.
Charlene: Yeah, again, I think about, um, it's not so much who controls my personal brand and everything it, this is about working in harmony. Between the corporate brand and your personal brand and, and I built an entire organization, alternative group that really originally supported and lifted up people's personal brands and at the same time as my corporate brand.
So one of my, my favorite moments is I was introducing, introducing myself to A CEO and I was like, I'm Charlene Lee with Alternative. He goes, oh, altimeter. I know Altimeter. I was so thrilled because all of our efforts to lift with the corporate brand was, that was carrying us. That only happened because we [00:26:00] did these two things in harmony.
So I think HR and comms working together need to be thinking about how do we support our executives to be able to, do both, have the corporate brand expressed in their personal brand and their personal brand expressed in their corporate space. So this is not about if this or that. It's Yes. And, and it, it requires having a proactive reputation plan.
Like what are the investments we're going to make in that reputation? How are we going to support that personal brand as a company and then also having a rapid response protocol so that if something does go wrong and it's either in the personal area or in the corporate space, what are we going to do to protect these assets?
Again, both personal and corporate. 'cause they're one in the same. It's the same person. There's no two different people here to have to think about. It's the same person. So the more we stop thinking about, you know, binary around this and think about it more holistically, the better off you're [00:27:00] going to be to look at this incredible asset of a person to say, how do we elevate it and support it to accomplish our common goals?
Jerry: We can't have a conversation about being digital online, not in 2025 without talking about ai, and we waited. 20 some odd minutes for us to talk about AI in this conversation for a reason. Um, how does this impact this, right? Because you have AI doing a lot of things in, in your space, right? You create content, uh, both written, um.
Chat, GPT, Claude, other things can do that for you. Now there are companies building specific LinkedIn and other sort of, uh, professional knowledge content engines to write on your behalf. There are AI bots that will comment for you. There are AI bots that will do a lot of these things, right? And then while there are, and, and, and more so, uh, creating video content, um, dubbing there, there's, and it's only gonna get better.
We're only gonna get worse depending on how you look at it, the options, the things that we can [00:28:00] do. Um, you, you've been in the game for a long time, and authenticity is something that we need to maintain, uh, in, in sort of how we come across. Um, give us your observation, you know, boil down, um, how. What, what are some of the trends that you see?
And then how can leaders stay ahead of it to make sure that they can, uh, remain authentic, be their human selves in a world, while there might be some efficiencies and tools that they actually can use to help, uh, augment their authenticity on the internet.
Charlene: The worst thing you can do is to outsource ai, your thinking and your values. That can only come from you. Now, AI can help you, uh, accentuate it, develop it, question it, it, I, I use AI constantly, not because I'm writing about it, because it makes me a better thinker. It makes me a better person. It makes me a better human.
Because it helps me understand the world better. It helps me understand people in my audiences better, and it helps me articulate the things that I'm [00:29:00] surfacing, but I haven't quite figured it out. It's just a great thought partner. So use AI but don't. Don't, uh, outsource it. Don't just completely delegate all of your thinking to it.
So I think about it as power prompting. When you are putting the questions into it, you have to be, especially, especially creative and thoughtful and curious because you only get out of AI what you put into it. So doubling down on that critical thinking, on your values on what it is that's important to you becomes even more paramount in the age of ai.
So if you do that. You have clarity on who you are and your values and what you wanna convey. AI becomes like this power exponential tool for you. That said, I think in this age right now when most people still think that AI is gonna be more harmful than beneficial, again, the stats say that only 39% of people in the US believe that as will be more beneficial than harmful.
So this is just a fundamental distrust of ai. We [00:30:00] have to be very transparent about when we're using AI and how we're using it. I, the pa, the number one, like that's a con. One question that I've been asked, and every single presentation over the past few months has been this. How much of this presentation was made by ai? They wanted to know like how much of it was me putting it in there? Did I just push a button and it came out and they were kind of curious what the slides looked so good. Did a human make this or did you make this? And you know, it's, I just find it to be such a curious question 'cause it's coming from so many directions.
And I say I made every single one of these slides myself, like painfully in PowerPoint with my mouse and everything. Some of the graphics are made with ai. Because I'm not a graphical designer. Some of them are made by graphical designers and, and I'm sitting here thinking I might have disclosures now because it keeps coming up.
This image was created by AI and the rest of it wasn't. You know, I, I, and so I do, we build trust in the age of ai, and I think right now we need [00:31:00] to be very clear when we're using it, how we're using it to, again, build that trust and that credibility. This is truly me. This is me. I use AI to help write it, but I reviewed every single piece of this.
This is me. I was always at the keyboard. This was not put out there and generated by ai. This is me. I.
Jerry: Whether you're watching this episode or listening to it, uh, we also attest that a hundred percent of this episode is us. These are not AI avatars or, or, or, uh, post edit magic. Um. And I think that conversation will grow, right? And it will evolve. Um, there are again, this technology, the technology itself gets better.
How people use it could be, you know, better or worse depending on how we look at it. But, you know, now, now there are companies working on things like, hey, you know, upload a, uh, and, and both you and I have, uh, and most of our audience, there's hours of content of us speaking somewhere. And so the AI can take our facial movements, our [00:32:00] mouth movements, and we can upload a script and it can create a.
Decent video of us speaking a, a prompt in different languages. And so it's only gonna go in that direction. Right? And so I think, um, the other side too, I think is, you know, in-person, again, events, uh, human engagements will only get more valuable and none of that stuff is gonna be in the room. Um, and so, you know, it also, I think, changes as, as much as we're talking about being present.
On digital platforms, uh, leaders, speakers, uh, need to be, you know, maybe even more so than ever thinking about how they can be present physically to really build, uh, engaging audiences and to build their movements. Um. This has been so fascinating, and, you know, Charlene, if we talk in six months, the, the topics may stay the same, but the things that we get to talk about in terms of, you know, um, what really is an ai, you know, um, speaker, right.
Um, I, I was at a conference recently where there was an [00:33:00] AI version of a notable thought leader, an AI version. Uh, and, and so, you know, um. As, as we close here, um, what, what are your thoughts on, on that regard? Right? In, in terms of any, you know, are you building a Charlene AI to, um, to, to give your speeches to, you know, and I know, um, on, uh, for, for your most recent, um, you know, PowerPoints and stuff, you've made it, but how are you leveraging that in your thought leadership business?
Charlene: Yeah, I, I do have an avatar, um, and it's, it's, it's, it's sort of in the, in the can, so to speak. So the WA footage is there, and then I can use it against any of the video engines that are out there. And I also have hooked it up to my knowledge base, so you can have. Live q and a with it. It's, it's okay. It's not great, but it just keeps getting better and better.
So to your point, uh, doing live, it doesn't have to be a necessarily in person but virtual, but where it's not just a broadcast anymore, but it's a dialogue. That is gonna be very hard to replace and it shows you thinking on your [00:34:00] feet and it's very authentic. It's just you having a conversation. So I, I think in this space, what we really want to do as digital leaders, ways to stand out, I think, is to be demonstrating that you are curious, that you can be collaborative and that you can be courageous.
That means, you know, thinking out loud, experimenting, saying, saying what worked and didn't work. I, I just did a live stream on vibe coding recently. I, I don't know how to code, I know really ancient HTML and the, you know, me trying to figure out what a GitHub commit is and why should I care and I never wanna do that again.
Uh, and, and so, but I could, I made an app. I made this really fun app that I've always wanted to make. And granted, I got a little help from my son who is an AI developer for psych development, but he was showing me how to do it just strictly by doing vibe coding without ever touching a piece of code. So this is the, the thing about, we can use ai, [00:35:00] but we need to figure out what needs to be done by humans.
In the end, the AI was doing the coding, but I was doing the vibing. I was creating the meaning, I was creating the connection, I was making the decisions. And so the, these are the things that make us human and be, be mind people that we are human here. Uh, and so I keep coming back to what we started at, that this is about creating a movement in that movements require leaders, not mandates.
So, you know, using AI to turbocharge your movement, I'm all for that. It needs to start with that intrinsic human need to create change to make things better. That's what leaders do. We create change sometimes very, very hard change, and that requires a leader in all their authenticity and vulnerability to be able to lead that.
Jerry: A unnecessary change. Uh, Charlene, this has been a, a wonderful, uh, thought provoking conversation. I, I've [00:36:00] learned so much. Uh, as we wrap here, leave us with this, uh, you know, in, in all the years that you've talked about this, studied this, and, and learned from, uh, so many of the other bright minds in the world.
Uh. What skills or mindsets can be the most effective, uh, digital leaders? Uh, what are the most effective skills that they can adopt today? Um, to distinguish themselves from the rest as we look to a evolving, ever changing a, you know, uh, frontier of personal branding and, uh, digital personalities in the world.
Charlene: Yeah, I, I think again, digital, digital and AI fluency is, is important, but I think really the mindset. Is gonna be real di differentiator. So the leaders who thrive with adoption and adapt constantly, who are grounded and unafraid are the ones who are gonna be doing really well. And, and, and I think it's also being able to thinking systems.
So instead of thinking about people and data and AI and strategy as separate silos to deal with, they're all interconnected. And [00:37:00] so if we can design and, and understand the world in all of its complexity. And not fight against that. And, and to simplify it so that we can take action, but still understand that this is a very complex world and to respect it and to enable ourselves and the people we're leading to be able to live in that complexity, live in that uncertainty.
I, again, I, I think leaders we're not trying to make and take away all the discomfort there, but we are trying to make it safe. So that we can give people the confidence that no matter what happens, we're gonna be okay. And that allows us to take these incredible risks that we never thought we could take.
We, we went through the pandemic who, if, if it, at, at the beginning of 2020, if we had told people, this is what you're gonna do over the next year, we've been like, there's no way. No way we could do that. Not only did we do it, we did it and found a reserve of resilience and strength that we never thought we had.
So [00:38:00] I love this adventure that we're on called Leadership and Life and, and I think again, the, the mindsets that are, are going to make it really work are again, this whole idea of curiosity and courage.
Jerry: Awesome. Charlene, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom, your stories, and your inspiration with us. Uh, we leave this conversation more empowered, uh, to to be vocal, to be present, and to lead, um, online in the real world, uh, to create the changes that we need to see. So Charlene, thank you so much for joining us on The Tomorrowist, and we'll see you tomorrow.
Charlene: Thank you. It's been an honor and privilege to be here.