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The energy has shifted in 2025. You can feel it too, right? AI used to be this shiny side project, something people would experiment with in their spare time. Theres been a massive change. AI is now baked into the way work gets done. Some people like myself have run with it, attempting to automate their entire workflow and educate their teams on the many dos and donts. Others are still staring at their screens and wondering where to start. The gap between those two groups is growing, and quickly. I have a secret to share, and this is where most people get it wrong: Closing the gap isnt about becoming a tech genius. Its about staying curious and getting scrappy. The AI skills gap is widening, but heres a game plan to keep up. 1. Build AI fluency, not just prompt tricks The first step to building AI fluency is learning how to prompt a chatbot. This is exactly where my own team began with our agencys weekly AI training program, coined Thursd-AI (very clever, I know). In this stage, you build your skillset and learn what AI can actually do across your workflow, and how to structure your asks to get meaningful results. Its not a magic command per se, more of a collaboration mindset. And heres a pro tip: You can actually ask your AI chatbot how can I improve this prompt to get a more accurate/more detailed response?and it will tell you! 2. Pick one workflow and start automating Dont overhaul everything at once. Start with one task you do often (summarizing docs, writing content, analyzing feedback) and let AI take a pass. Then refine it. The more you experiment with this, the faster youll get a feel for whats possible, and whats most realistic for you. 3. Follow the builders, not just the headlines The news is relentlessly covering AI, but that doesnt mean these stories are always packed with value. The real insights, the kinds that will make you stand out, are not in the stories with catchy headlines. Seek out case studies, tutorials, and demos from people are using AI in the wild. Follow technologists, no-code tinkerers, indie hackers, the companies making it happen, and people sharing real, tactical ways to apply AI today. A great place to start is OpenAI News, Google AI News, AI Foundations on YouTube, and Quantiouss Weekly Tech Roundup (yes, a shameless plug for my agencys tech newsletter). 4. Make AI a daily habit The people staying ahead arent just using AI occasionally, theyre working with it every day. That means brainstorming with ChatGPT, creating reports with Perplexity, or turning text-to-image with Canva. Youve likely heard this once, and Ill say it again; You need to treat AI as a team member. 5. Focus on what AI cant replace For now, ignore the news saying that AI is going to make us dumb. AI is not meant to make us lazy, its meant to allow us to take charge of our projects and our lives and empower us to be more powerful, more effective, and more creative. AI cannot replace soft skills, creative instincts, and emotional intelligencethis is where you come in. The more that AI handles the grunt work, the more you are empowered to use these skills. Use AI to buy back your time, and use that time to get better at being you. Use your critical thinking skills, trust your instincts, and embrace your human curiosity and creativity, while AI handles the little details. You know, the little details that used to leave you in a time crunch and keep you from being your fully present, creative self. The AI fluency gap isnt about who knows the most, its about who is willing to put in the work learning by trial and error. Youre never going to find a one-size-fits-all approach with AI. Stop waiting on a roadmap, and start building your own. In just a few months, youll be amazed at how much youve learned and how far youve come. The biggest risk here is sitting still. If youre still reading this, youre further along than you think. Lisa Larson-Kelley is founder and CEO at Quantious.
Category:
E-Commerce
On this weeks episode of The Most Innovative Companies Podcast, Josh and Yaz sit down with Sweetgreen CEO Jonathan Neman to talk all things Sweetgreen from prices to AI “cooks” and his favorite item on the menu.
Category:
E-Commerce
Less than a year after she came out with her Grammy-winning album Short n Sweet, pop singer Sabrina Carpenter announced the release date of her next project, titled Mans Best Friend, with a new album cover on Wednesday, and it has ignited a headline-grabbing debate. While some fans of the singer are salivating over the mere mention of another Sabrina Summer, others are none too happy with the album covers messaging. The cover depicts Carpenter in heels and a black minidress, crouching on the floor. An anonymous man holds a handful of her iconic blonde hair. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Sabrina Carpenter (@sabrinacarpenter) Fans and critics immediately took to social media to voice their support or concerns with the images messaging, and though many fans staunchly defend Carpenter and the album cover as satirical, exaggerated, and ironic, others, including the domestic violence advocacy group Glasgow Womens Aid, say that the image of a Carpenter kneeling on the ground being dragged by her hair is triggering, regressive, and frankly, distasteful. Pushing boundaries or tired tropes? Discourse about the albums imagery calls to mind a long history of public criticism directed toward women artists. Many women who have challenged boundaries around what was acceptable in music and other artistic disciplines have found themselves on the receiving end of cultural blowback, but this conversation reads differently. The prevalence of social media means that the album cover went viral overnight, as people saw and posted about the new cover, and some critics worry about the impact of the message on young fans. (Carpenter is a former Disney Channel star.) Fans also have the ability insult each others intelligence overtly via Instagram and TikTok, calling those who dont get it dumb and dense. Comments on the original Instagram post lean both directions, with some expressing their excitement and others telling Carpenter that the cover is not the slay you think it is. One user explained that even if the cover is an ironic joke, it’s not an effective one. If the fans who know all of her lore are the only ones who can interpret her attempt, that isnt satire,” the user wrote. “[It’s] an inside joke that reads misogynistic to everyone else which makes it really harmful.” Still, Carpenter is known for the wry messaging in her music, prompting some TikTok users to call out others whom they claimed just didn’t get it. The people criticizing Sabrina Carpenters new album cover for Mans Best Friend are so obtuse, said one TikToker in a video. None of you have ever used context clues in your life and it shows. However, others accuse Carpenter of not paying attention to context. A common refrain is that Carpenter is acting oblivious to America’s current political climate and the deep misogyny that runs through it. One TikToker said the album cover was giving the same vibes as Dr. Squatchs giveaway of the soap called Sydneys Bathwater Bliss. (Allegedly, the soap is infused with actress Sydney Sweeneys actual bathwater.) The user also cited the social media trends of tradwife life, the clean girl aesthetic, and the promotion of white thinness as signs of a slide back into conservatism. Read the room, the user said in her video. Its using dark humor in a situation thats not appropriate whatsoever.”
Category:
E-Commerce
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