Discover how the digital realm is shaping our well-being with guest Bailey Parnell, Founder and CEO of Skills Camp.
In our rich and engaging discussion, Bailey brings to light the profound effects of generative AI and the complexities of social media on our mental health. As we peel back the layers of our online lives, we confront the harsh realities and potential threats that lurk behind our screens, from the unsettling spread of deepfakes to the insidious nature of social comparisons.
Journey with us through the intricate web of digital connections as we examine the ways in which our self-perception and relationships are influenced by the curated 'highlight reels' we see online. We scrutinize the burdens of public scrutiny on individuals, particularly public figures, and consider how this relentless spotlight can skew our sense of self and warp our interactions. Our dialogue traverses the challenging landscape of social media, emphasizing the need for perspective and self-awareness in navigating this new normal.
Wrapping up with a touch of optimism, our episode shifts to the brighter prospects AI brings to the professional world. Bailey discusses how AI is starting to revolutionize work-life balance, offering hope for a more efficient and mentally fulfilling future. By harnessing the power of technology, we envision a workspace where productivity and personal well-being coexist harmoniously, marking the dawn of a new era in professional development and digital wellness.
You can find out more about Bailey's organization SkillsCamp at https://www.skillscamp.co/
If you'd like to learn more about her charity work with #SAFESOCIAL go to https://safesocialmedia.co/
Find our more about Wellbeing at Work's Global Summits, our Global Hub Community of C-Suite executives and our Bespoke division at wellbeingatwork.world
Discover how the digital realm is shaping our well-being with guest Bailey Parnell, Founder and CEO of Skills Camp.
In our rich and engaging discussion, Bailey brings to light the profound effects of generative AI and the complexities of social media on our mental health. As we peel back the layers of our online lives, we confront the harsh realities and potential threats that lurk behind our screens, from the unsettling spread of deepfakes to the insidious nature of social comparisons.
Journey with us through the intricate web of digital connections as we examine the ways in which our self-perception and relationships are influenced by the curated 'highlight reels' we see online. We scrutinize the burdens of public scrutiny on individuals, particularly public figures, and consider how this relentless spotlight can skew our sense of self and warp our interactions. Our dialogue traverses the challenging landscape of social media, emphasizing the need for perspective and self-awareness in navigating this new normal.
Wrapping up with a touch of optimism, our episode shifts to the brighter prospects AI brings to the professional world. Bailey discusses how AI is starting to revolutionize work-life balance, offering hope for a more efficient and mentally fulfilling future. By harnessing the power of technology, we envision a workspace where productivity and personal well-being coexist harmoniously, marking the dawn of a new era in professional development and digital wellness.
You can find out more about Bailey's organization SkillsCamp at https://www.skillscamp.co/
If you'd like to learn more about her charity work with #SAFESOCIAL go to https://safesocialmedia.co/
Find our more about Wellbeing at Work's Global Summits, our Global Hub Community of C-Suite executives and our Bespoke division at wellbeingatwork.world
Hello and welcome to the latest episode of Conversations on Well-Being at Work, the podcast by Well-Being at Work World featuring discussions with innovative HR and wellbeing leaders from around the globe. I'm John Brewer and I'm part of a team at Well-Being at Work. I'm focused on content for the Americas. We do produce global summits in eight regions around the world. We have a global hub community for HR leaders and a bespoke division that provides in-depth strategic masterclasses and workshops to our growing C-suite community.
Speaker 1:So I do urge you to visit our website at wellbeingatworkworld. You can find out all about our summits, as well as all the other great stuff that we're doing. So it's great to welcome today our guest who's going to be speaking at our upcoming summit in New York City in about six weeks, which should be really great. I'm joined by Bailey Parnell. She's the founder and CEO of Skills Camp, which is a soft skills company. She's studying digital wellbeing and also has a non-profit organization called the Center for Digital Well-Being as well, which is going to be a large part of our conversation today. So welcome, bailey, great to see you here.
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you for having me, and I'm really looking forward to our event in a little bit in New York City.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it'll be a lot of fun and there's a lot of really good stuff and I appreciate you agreeing to join us Now. I think it's maybe a bit of an old question, but I do want to check in first that you are the real Bailey Parnell, not the AI version. I know you had a little video posted on LinkedIn this week where you had an avatar. That I thought was quite impressive, and if I say in a scary way, I don't mean personally I was scared of you, but just the idea that we can reproduce people so accurately.
Speaker 2:Listen. In a way, it is scary for a lot of people and it really made people feel uneasy. So, for listeners who don't yet follow me on LinkedIn or all that jazz, what I did was, in part of my work, I studied generative AI and I'm an educator, of course, and so I know what's happening in the generative AI space, but I also know where the general public is at their level of understanding, and so part of my role is to bridge that understanding, and so I created a video using an app called HeyGen, which, honestly, anyone can sign up for. But I just happened to know a little bit more about where we're at, and a little bit more about where we're at I create an avatar now and audio, so imagine even the setup, if you're watching, almost looks exactly like what I did today, and I was just talking to the camera and I just said Hello, my name is Bailey Parnell, this is what I do, and that was all it needed.
Speaker 2:Then I went and I typed in what I wanted to say in the video, took a few minutes and gave back to me the video that John was talking about on LinkedIn, and we are so far now that the video for most people was indistinguishable from me as a person Once they watched and they saw the spoiler that it was actually my AI avatar. Then they watched it again and they said oh yeah, like your hand movements are off, or I noticed that sometimes your facial expressions don't match what you. But that was just my first attempt with the avatar. So if I had actually spent like a good amount of time creating a really good avatar, I'm sure that even that wouldn't have been there.
Speaker 1:It is shocking how easy it's become and obviously we've seen what's reason that we Taylor Swift the ability of just hundreds of people to create really obnoxious videos using, using AI and distributing, and also not it's not just the use of it is very easy, but also the distribution.
Speaker 2:You're right, not only the creation of this stuff, because now anyone can do that on Dolly create some imagery, and this stuff is available, and I've just shown you a video Now, in order to make that video, I did have to sign something that said oh yes, this is me and I'm creating it for myself. However, I'm sure there's a lot of people that could that don't care, because the dark side of technology is the dark side of people, and there are people who do not care and they will use that technology to create fake nudes of Taylor Swift, and then the same people will be the ones that spread it online. And you know that situation where, if you've not heard of this story before, what it sounds like, people created images that were fake of Taylor Swift in compromising positions, exposed nude in, I guess, like at the sports games, and these went viral. Now, why this?
Speaker 2:It's, besides the uneasy fact that it really does look like her, because of AI, what makes me even more uneasy is that this just continues the same Misogyny, the same sexism that has always existed, and tech is going to amplify the parts of humans that were already there, and so I just think it makes me like. It's like an icky feeling like that Unusiness people felt about my video is how I feel for her. Yes, it doesn't matter if you're famous, it doesn't matter how much money you make. Of course it's going to be women who are going to be violated that way, first by AI. Yeah, yeah, we ain't that, ain't it.
Speaker 1:No, there is a. The reason I raise it is as a general, as a genuine, serious and negative impacts on the well-being of people who are the subject of this thing, and I'm sure we'll get on to talk a little bit more about that and we'll also no doubt working something on the AI. I know it was obviously an area around. I know you've done stuff with with tink, with tink, with teens around healthy use of social media. This is an area that you've you've worked in for a number of years right.
Speaker 1:I know you're gonna have a lot of great insight for us. I thought maybe a good place to start would actually be to look at Social media and the positive impact that can have on people's well-being, because we're all about human connection right now, and isn't that what social media is about to right?
Speaker 2:That's right and I'm glad that you've asked that question, because when I've situated myself in this world with digital being and I'd, I'd like to think, was Earlier than a lot of peers these days I'd like to think I had some contribution to this. But when I started coming out and researching social media's impact on mental health, which was just over a decade ago, I was finding a lot of research that said social media is causing harm. It's like making people feel depressed or whatnot. But then what I also found which I was not hearing about in the news, of course Was a whole area of research that said social media was having a positive impact on their participants well-being, and you can go read my thesis for yourself, like you can read the the journal articles and the studies if you want to. But that was actually what guided my early research was wait a sec how, what is happening for people to be having good experiences here and what's happening when they don't like. How come some people are showing up and live in their best life on social media. They walk away happier, motivated, all these things, what's going on? And so that we can get into what was going on for sure, but to arrive you at the end of how people who have positive experiences on social media, how they tend to use it.
Speaker 2:I'll give you some examples that have come out of a classroom that was grade four, so this is just as young as nine years old, and this is actually what they said. Because I ask them why are you on social media? And yes, they are on, by the way, at nine years old but I say, why are you using it? Because we're not. All of us probably everyone listening here is on. So we're not. It's not all bad. And some of the things they say are I get to raise awareness for social causes.
Speaker 2:I get to build community and connections. I Connect with family and friends. I get to be really creative on social media. I get to make videos or I get to make my bracelets or show off my wheezing, and now I have a place to share that with people. I get to spread positivity and kindness. I get to learn about different things personal branding, relationship building, literally. We would not even be here on this podcast if it weren't for the good side of social media, because that's where we found each other on LinkedIn. So there are so many positive uses here and a lot of my work at the center and with safe social is how do we get the benefits of this with less risk?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know. I remember reading many years ago a book by Sherry Turkle called Life on the Screen, which was, which had one of the sort of thesis of that was, you know, that people who were quite introverted and awkward and maybe not very socially able were able to had a forum on Mrs Free social media, using muds and the like, dating myself there, but they would. It gave them an outlet where they could express different aspects of themselves. There was a sort of real Hope. I thought in her writing that we were on, we had a technology here that was gonna enable people and was enabling people to realize Themselves in a way that they were constrained in the real world.
Speaker 2:I'm very much of the idea that we have a Interrelated relationship with technology. That ends up being cyclical, but the technology of itself can be used Under human aims, like you can use either the classic, like you can use a knife to kill someone or to chop vegetables, and really it's. We have a yes, yes.
Speaker 2:Tway who are saying wait a sec, I can see my family. I can on that episode of Star Trek. I look at my family across the world and I feel like I'm maintaining a relationship with them and that is very different than longest-distance phone calls that cost a million bucks. So there are all these positive uses and I will always say that the dark side of social media, the dark side of AI, is typically the dark side of humans and people might not expect this, but in my master's research I was asking people like tell me about your experiences on social media, what makes it good, what makes it bad? Blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2:And what I actually found was the number one most important thing about whether or not you would have a good or bad experience on social media and how good or how bad was how you felt about yourself offline at time of use, or what we technically call offline affect. What this means is that with social media, if you're feeling good about yourself, your life, you're working on something that motivates you. You even just went for a walk today and you feel like better. You are more likely to have a good experience on social media, to see people differently, to interpret content differently, than if you had a bad moment just before. If you're feeling bad about yourself, if you are trying to focus and you can't on this report, then you go on social media and the exact same content could affect you differently. So then, that presupposes that the most important thing, which seems counterintuitive here, is actually to one, build an offline life that you love and, two, to work on your offline soft skills.
Speaker 1:Actually, yeah, and I guess so. It's amplifying how you are in the real world. But as you're describing that, I'm thinking about the experience of many people where there's so many people presenting idealized images of themselves that it's hard to everyone seems to be living a perfect life except me. Am I the only one? And that's clearly not true, but it's very seductive, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Very seductive because it's funny you say this actually. Then this is unplanned to listeners because John doesn't know this, but the basis of my master's research, the theoretical framework, was social comparison theory, so I actually know quite a lot about this as well, because social comparison the idea is that this is actually how humans have always constructed a portion of our identity, the idea that I know that I'm a tall person because I am able to look around and see that most people are shorter than me and therefore this informed was my identity as a tall person. Something very simple like this. And social comparison was happening long before social media. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. The phone, the magazines, whatever it was.
Speaker 1:I've got a bigger cave than the guy next door, right?
Speaker 2:100%. This was always going on and literally that phrase keeping up with the Joneses is social comparison. But all that's to say there is some differences on social media, and on one it's that it's directly tied to you and there's a social currency, some numbers that kind of trick your brain into thinking that this is an objective comparison when it's anything but. And then I also teach a lot about the highlight reel, which is that social media is a collection of our best and brightest moments, just like a sports highlight reel, but no one is seeing the 99% behind the scenes.
Speaker 2:And so when we compare our behind the scenes, our everyday life, to someone's highlight reel no-transcript we would actually call that an unreasonable comparison. If I had said to you, we're comparing the best, you're hey, this farmer, you can give me your best orange, I'm giving you 10 best oranges and then I said, okay, you have to compare every orange on your farm, You'd be saying that's an unreasonable, unfair comparison and in a way, we're the oranges, okay, Like we're the one saying look at my whole entire life compared to just people's best moments. It's unreasonable, but it's a very natural, normal part of this complicated it's funny you should mention keeping up with the Joneses.
Speaker 1:I don't know if you're familiar with it. It might be. He's a British fellow I mean he's long gone now A fellow called Quentin Crisp. Are you familiar with him at all? No, he was sort of a pioneer in the LGBT community in the UK and he wrote a book called the Naked Civil Servant which was about him, his experience being gay as a civil servant.
Speaker 1:But he became this sort of eccentric kind of bon vivure later in life and one of the things he said was that keeping up with the Joneses it's way too much effort. You're much better off spending your time dragging them down to your level which, of course, is what happens a lot in social media is that you see those people out there. Rather than for many people, what we see is, rather than seeing people aspire to it and Taylor Swift would be a great example here what we're seeing is not people saying, oh, taylor Swift isn't that lovely. She's going to the football game, but it's not. It's just some terrible conspiracy and there's something horrible going on here. She's a faker. Music isn't any good anyway. I mean, there's a lot of energy people put in that environment, not into, not aspiring for other people's lives, but trying to pull people down.
Speaker 2:It is so funny that you've said that today because literally just yesterday I was on a call with someone and part of what I do in kind of the consulting area speaking area of my life is I work on TV shows and I work primarily on reality TV shows where contestants a lot of people don't know this actually, but for a lot of the reality TV that exists out there, there's actually a psychology team that is paired with the reality TV shows. This wasn't happening maybe even 10, 15 years ago, but obviously there's more of an understanding of mental health now and I'm sure there's some liability conversations or something that made it happen. However, when they're sent to me, when contestants are sent to me, is because what they were realizing was more and more the mental health concerns that related to contestants after they leave the show had very much to do with social media and this is unsurprising. But there is an ownership people feel over slightly even remotely famous people that I don't personally relate to. I do not think that because you have earned or got, for whatever reason, some kind of fame, that I own you, but the reason why I was talking about this yesterday was because there was someone who was being attacked in their comments and whatnot after they had been on the show and that, even though they knew that people were completely misunderstanding, it was misrepresented, they didn't know the full story. They don't actually know who they are as a person. So we did an exercise which was about almost describing the troll.
Speaker 2:Let's talk through the people, let's talk through the reasons, really talk it through, let's think through why people do this stuff, and some of the stuff that came up would not be surprising to you and to people guessing this. Some of the reasons I came up with were their unhappy themselves, and even if they don't realize it, there is a level of unhappiness in order to spend all my spare time hating on people's comments, regardless of if they're famous, by the way, I don't care if they are famous. They're not reading the comments. That's one.
Speaker 2:There's also boredom, which I would sometimes put in the unhappiness category, because when I'm doing nothing I'm not bored. I'm doing that on purpose and I probably love it. So there's a difference of experience there. But then there's maybe a lack of critical thinking, more complex thinking that might guide them to do it. For example, being able to hold two ideas in your mind at the same time that someone you can maybe not like someone's music and still wish well for them like holding that complexity and though we cross over into the last one we talked about, wish was. I really truly do not think this is even the majority of people who do this, but you can get over into masochism and I think it's called shydenfreude, something like that.
Speaker 2:A bit of masochism, where we're saying there is actually pleasure in other people's discomfort and downfall, and that is where you're getting into the copathy a little.
Speaker 1:Yeah, shydenfreude, taking pleasure in the misery of others.
Speaker 2:It's a German word of course. Yeah. So the masochism there is that I don't actually think that they are the majority of people that do this. I do think that the majority of people that do this are forgetting that Just because you're behind the screen should not remove your empathy. I doubt, highly doubt, they would do this if they were in person. Well what were we?
Speaker 1:I think it's interesting comparison. So I don't one of the things that you said and I think because a lot of our, a lot of the people in our audience, both at the events on the podcast, probably have kids of school age Varying, and I'm quite a range I would think you were talking about used to use the social media being like a risk behavior, not unlike driving or drugs, and driving is one of those things where there seems to be a lot more road. People seem not more willing to exhibit road rage now that they've been angry on online as well. It's everything goes everywhere. But is that?
Speaker 2:is it overstating it to say that being on social media is risky behavior like driving or drugs, or this is exactly the framing that has, dare, I say, contributed to my success, because I came out and said and I'm still saying, why does anyone will listen that social media is a risky behavior, like sex or drugs or alcohol, and I've said that all around the world and I've said it for a decade. And the reason why is because a risky behavior, in Psychology, is simply something where, when you participate, you expose yourself to potential harm. And we know for sure now, as we've just been talking about for 20 minutes is Social media. There are risks of using. You might feel depressed, you might end up blacking out and not remembering what you've done, you might end up feeling lonely, you might compare yourself, you might get harassed, and the list really goes on and on. And guess what? That, because you spent time in that risky environment, that might affect your offline life too. You might be feeling agitated and not know why. You might feel like the world is so polarized and you have no means of changing it. No, it's all efficacy here. So there's a ton of risks of using, which means, then, why we use. I guess really treating it like a risky behavior will give you your treatment plan and I would say, then similar to other risky behaviors.
Speaker 2:Let's say we're talking about alcohol. It's probably more useful for someone listening or for their kids To think about social media, to parent around it, to discuss it in the same category as alcohol. Then just to include it in the same category as, say, the computer or the TV, because the impact on your life is closer to other risky behaviors, which means that might change your lens of conversations. You might be thinking like how do I use? Or when do I use? Why do I use? Is it because I'm bored or is it because I'm unhappy and I'm trying to fill a hole? Is it because I don't feel fulfilled elsewhere? That is going to yield more negative experiences on social than if you're using because you do connect with people, because it is a way to Express, because you can share a voice here that you didn't previously have. So yes, I do not think it's overstated all to say that it is a risky behavior that is probably having farther reaching and longer lasting consequences than even alcohol.
Speaker 2:Yes, and other there are young people particularly vulnerable to this or yes, are young people 100%, just like any other risky behavior. Young people are more at risk and there's a few reasons for this one. They are normally at a stage of life let's say between not an 11 to 18 typical puberty years, a Normal phase of life, where you start going outside the family and start engaging in more peer-to-peer comparison as a way to build your identity, to do to figure out who I am, that kind of stuff that we're talking about here. So that was already happening before social media but, like we said now, it's always on, it doesn't turn off, it's directly tied to you and it comes home with you after school. Yeah, so there's that they are already at that phase of life. If you're under 25, your brain is not done growing, so you are more at risk for any risky behavior, and especially one that involves any kind of conditioning, because your brain is literally not done yet. It's gonna incorporate that into its core mechanics.
Speaker 2:And then why I feel young people today, in 2024, are particularly at risk is just because we're at a strange time of history, to be honest.
Speaker 2:We're at this weird time of history where, let's say, a young person is Experiencing something in relationship to social media and they are feeling oh my gosh. Young people are more anxious these days and people I just don't understand why. I can tell you why, but one of the reasons includes social media. So let's say they are experiencing something and they are being harassed in their DMs. The people that you would typically go to for supports in these areas let's say coaches, teachers, parents largely right now, just based on history is, you know, these people did not grow up with social media themselves, so sometimes they can conceptually understand it, but they want to say things like why do you care? Who cares if they don't like your photo, stuff like this? And so then the typical supports for stuff in this area Do not have the same understanding, even as maybe a 14 year old today, of what it actually means in their daily life, and that could be really challenging.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so is it. On the other side, there's these social, social issues that we've talked about, but there's also, like that physical sense of it, this idea that the little hits of dopamine you get every time you get a tweet or a text, or there's a the next tiktok movie. I've got a colleague who works I don't work with her because she's on the Australian side at well-being at work. Who's bought this little jail that she's put her phone in now, so her phone is now in jail. She can't handle a jail. Her phone only between after six o'clock in the evening or whatever it is. Is that something that's fairly sort of persistent? Or the jail? Just people and I personally spend way too much time on my phone and I wish I could. Perhaps I need to invest in a jail or just some self-control.
Speaker 2:So jail would be actually a strategy. That would be temporary abstinence, like how do I Get off completely? How do I take a break? And I'm having trouble with my own discipline in doing that is what it tells me. Yeah, now I think everyone should take breaks, even if I think I have a decent relationship with social media now and, by the way, it always changes, so that might not be true in five years I'll have to come right back to this but I do have a decent relationship with my phone and with some social media. So for me it's going to look a little bit different than it would for others. We're going to have different safe social strategies and safe use strategies safe, as in, healthy strategies.
Speaker 2:But I think what sentiment that we're getting at, that both of you are experiencing, is very common, which is, I feel, overwhelmed by this thing. I feel like this is more than what I would care to be doing on this. There are some people who, I bet, spend the exact same amount of time as you on it, but don't feel that same way, which means it's going to affect you worse than it affects them, even if it's the same amount of time. So I always get asked by parents and whatnot. I always get the ask question about screen time and I say I know you all want an answer on screen time, but actually the most recent research has been saying for a little bit it's the quality of the time, not the quantity of the time, that will have a greater impact.
Speaker 2:And this makes a lot of sense to me because you can have you're on a road trip, you're spending a few hours on your phone. That's not inherently bad in that way, like for your mental health. What would be worse is, even if you spent 15 minutes and you were triggered three times by something you didn't expect to see, that is going to cause you much more damage for the rest of the day and that's why I say your first line of defense should be checking in with yourself If you don't feel like you can handle that. Basically, russian roulette when you open up your Instagram feed, you better, you're feeling good. Before you open it up, you just don't know how you're going to feel after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So that sort of experience varies quite a lot. It's not just there isn't a simple metric around time, which is what the and I'm sure Michelle's doing really well with her strategy. The jail, the jail issue and I don't even know. Do you know what? John?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you make me think because we're at the well-being at work, like this is what we're thinking about, and I know that we spent a lot of time talking about personal social media use, but I really want to make clear to everyone here that it does not matter.
Speaker 2:It doesn't matter. Your brain does not distinguish when you started work, and also social media use at lunch is not going to be that different than social media use 10 minutes before lunch. In the world of work, where social media tends to be brought up the most these days is, I would say, distraction. Yes, like an inability to focus, do in part to what we just spoke about about not people not feeling like they have control or their own discipline over their own use. Like this would be a sign of addiction in a way, if we added it with some other signs. And the other thing that I hear a lot about is how our professionals using social media will always be a topic of conversation. How are they presenting themselves online, and should there or could there be consequences when that gets around to your workplace based on how you present yourself online, and that's always a fun debate, yeah.
Speaker 1:And there is that, the whole thing with technology and the way in which that tethers you to work beyond the hours that would traditionally be what was considered work.
Speaker 1:When I started work, you could only work when you were at the office, because that was where the phone was, that people would call, and once you left or once you closed the door, you were done. And now that work is infiltrating the rest of your life in the same way as that whole outside world through social media resources. So it's getting a little crowded in here right now. That's all I said you are right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, We've spent a lot of time talking about social media, but digital well-being in general, especially in the world of work, includes many other areas, probably more so than social media would be. Say something like you just mentioned If I've got an direct like a teams chat going with my team, am I expected to be answering that teams chat into the wee hours of the night just because they know that it is with me now? And that would be an element of digital well-being in the workplace for sure, Definitely. I'd say most of it is outside of social media actually in the workplace.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think I'm sure it's something we'll touch on come March at the event, but it is one of the things that I'm going to go off and attend here now. I know a lot of people talk about integrating work and life. Work is no longer somewhere you go, it's something that inserted into your timeline as you move through the world wherever you might be. And I'm a traditionalist and I'm a great believer in balance. You really need a boundary between the work and the life bit. In the same way, you need a boundary between the outside, the social, the virtual world, and the real world, and it seems to me that's one of the sort of why I really particularly like work-life integration. I tend to think that the technology tends to sort of stage a hostile takeover. It's not a merger, it's an acquisition.
Speaker 2:That's interesting. I think that it's true privilege to get to a spot of work-life integration where it feels good, this good, where you have the discipline to be able to separate those moments, and for me, I would say I'm very much operating in work-life integration like work-life flow, for sure, but I'm talking from the position of someone who does own my businesses and who does work in education, so I would do this stuff for fun. Most people in my life, though, need some balance, like they actually want to leave their job every day because, guess what, they don't own the company and, guess what, they would like to spend time with their family uninterrupted about X, y or Z. So it is a really interesting conversation, but I do think it's really a gift of life if you can get there, while work-life flow is one of the most liberating experiences ever.
Speaker 1:I wish we'd known beforehand. I would have put all this social media stuff to one side and we could just have had a good argument about life balance or work-life integration.
Speaker 2:Yeah no, I think you're right, though a lot of people just simply need balance. Right now, they're not at that privilege of flow in a way that is actually getting the outcome of well-being.
Speaker 1:So we're nearing the end of our allotted time for our conversation, but there's one thing I want to cover before we do it, because we started with a brief riff on your use of artificial intelligence. Obviously, that's top of mind for a lot of people right now work, how that's changing the world of work, and all sorts of Even our initial conversation before we started recording about the use of AI on podcast platforms. What do you see as being? What's the next thing that a year from now, when we do episode two of this conversation, how is AI going to change that conversation for us? Do you think? Wow?
Speaker 2:I have to say there are things that, as excited as I am about AI, I do get generally excited about new technologies. You can trust I am a balanced person and I do have things that keep me up at night, and one of the things that most keeps me up at night literally the thing I stress about most often is will be AI's contribution to polarization, misinformation and the fall of democracy, and so I am no big deal or anything. So why I'm particularly concerned now, and why I do think we will absolutely be talking about this one year from now, is it will have played a major role in the US election. I just I already know it already is. By the way, there was just literally last week there was like a robocall that was fake that went out from Joe Biden's voice telling people not to vote.
Speaker 1:Right, yes.
Speaker 2:And this stresses me out quite a lot, because democracy is built on shared understanding of truth, and now there's no shared understanding of truth. So I think what I'm hoping to see is policy in this area, some regulation. I do think that politicians will be more motivated to act quickly, more quickly than they have been with social media, which has not existed in 20 years, but, I think, more quickly because it will actually affect their ability to I said just today I saw Lindsey Graham on TV saying to Mark Zuckerberg you have blood on his hands because of the damage that social media has done.
Speaker 1:We don't want him saying that to some AI exact a year from now, do we Really?
Speaker 2:If you ask me, there is already blood on hands. I guess I saw it. Yeah, it is hands, because it is how the humans use the AI. But there's a great book called Scary Smart by Mogadda and he talks about how, even in early AI, the things that it was used for most was buying killing spying. And one more thing I forget what it was buying killing spying. I forget the fourth one, but basically it was actually used to kill quicker than it was used to help people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, what a cheery note. What a cheery note to end.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but you know what? No wait, let me say one thing, Say one thing positive before we finish. Do not let this fear take over your brain. Okay, I'm working on it for you. There's a lot of good people working on this to make it a good, healthy space and actually I promise you AI is going to unbelievably positively impact your life. If you're not already an AI-assisted professional, you can get back a lot of time. You can get back a lot of well-being. Believe this that it's already happened for me.
Speaker 1:No, I would agree. I found it very useful, like at the, currently just at the margins of things, but you can see how the potential's just starting. So thank you, I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. I'm really glad you took the time to. You've committed your time to be at the event, but to give your time up for us to sit for the time we have chatting has been great, and we've barely obviously only scratched the surface of what you know and have experienced in this field. So I'm looking forward to meeting you in person in just a few short weeks.
Speaker 2:Thank, you very much. Me too, thank you Thank you Take care, thank you.