How To Stay Relevant In the Age of AI

Imagine this: It’s date night, circa 1999. Netflix hasn’t been invented yet, and you’re planning a cozy night in with your sweetheart. You head out to Blockbuster to wander the aisles and choose a VHS to pop in the player at home and snuggle up for a movie night.

Corporate leadership at Blockbuster, a company grossing over $5 billion in annual revenue at that time, could not have predicted what came next. In fact, when Netflix first entered the scene a year later, Blockbuster’s leadership practically laughed at the ridiculous idea that people would order movies from home and wait for them to come in the mail.

But by 2010, Blockbuster was filing for bankruptcy, and it wasn’t just Blockbuster that was in trouble. By 2017, online shopping in every sector had overtaken in-person shopping. The golden age of shopping malls was over, and today most shopping malls are an echo of what they used to be, if they are still operating at all.

Now, we are experiencing an even more profound shift in the way that people live, work, and shop. AI models continue to improve, continue to take over jobs that formerly only humans could do, and continue to astonish us with their capability.

In the midst of this transformation, we should all be asking the question that Blockbuster failed to ask in 1999: What can I do now, to still be relevant five years from now?

Many humans are doing exactly what Blockbuster did in its final years: Holding jobs that are becoming outdated, believing their good fortune will continue forever, without significantly changing what they are doing. Many humans are going to face the same troubles Blockbuster did, if they don’t find a way to remain relevant.

As I’ve written about elsewhere, I believe complex sales will continue to require a human salesperson.  But even that might not remain true forever, and regardless, we should all be looking at how we can become more relevant, not less, in the age of AI.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot, actually, and here are three of the things I think every salesperson should be doing:

One: Learn to Love AI

AI proponents have been saying this from day one: It’s here to stay, so you may as well learn to use it. But I want to take that a step further: Don’t just learn it, love it. Study it, practice it, take classes, find out what it can do, and then have fun with it.

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I recently used Claude to build software for people I care about, to make their businesses run more effectively. It’s incredible what Claude is capable of, which I never would have dreamed possible. And because I understand what it’s capable of, I’m able to deploy my domain expertise and my systems thinking training to do more than I could without it.

If Blockbuster’s CEO had taken the time to study the market for mail-order movies, understand the technologies supporting the growing field of online shopping, and practiced using some of it for his own business… he might still be in business. Salespeople should take note.

Two: Become MORE Human

One thing AI can’t do, no matter what else happens, is be human.

A few weeks ago, my daughter asked me if we could go out and get a coffee. My son was there too, and she and he started googling, and my daughter found a Brazilian cafe she wanted to try, with sweets and street food. So we went.

We went for coffee and stayed for four hours. The owner was Brazilian. He was super friendly, wanted to connect with everyone, and asked for all our names. He makes the sweets and foods himself, and he and his girlfriend had decorated the whole cafe in colors from his hometown.

We’ve become so accustomed to corporate fast food chains that all look the same, serving the same pre-made stuff from the same distributor. And here was this guy making food from scratch and creating a human experience for customers that cannot be found anywhere else.

We drank coffee, we had sweets, then we moved on to street food, and ended up eating dinner there too. We tried almost everything on the menu, and we can’t wait to go back again soon.

When someone is passionate about something and gives their whole self to it, it’s unforgettable. And, at least for now, that’s something AI cannot repeat, just like Starbucks can’t recreate the experience of someone who is simply passionate about his craft.

To remain relevant and become indispensable as a salesperson, we need to offer a human experience that can’t be repeated by a machine. Develop the skills of systems thinking, become a catalyst for decision making, and help stakeholders align with a shared mental model to actually achieve their goals.

Three: Love What You Do

The owner of that Brazilian cafe didn’t create that four-hour wanna-go-back experience because it was a job he felt obligated to do. He created it because he is passionate about the food and culture of his hometown. Because he is passionate about people and creating exciting experiences for them. Because he loves to host and loves to take care of people and loves to share the flavors and style of a place he is passionate about.

If we want to remain relevant, we as sales professionals need to become passionate and enthusiastic about our work. We need to care about helping people solve problems, immerse ourselves in the work of learning to think in systems terms and help stakeholders align with a shared mental model. When we bring the passion and the fire to the job, we remain relevant because you can’t replace that with a machine.

They say hindsight is 20/20, and Blockbuster did the best it could with the knowledge it had at the time. But we have the benefit of learning the lesson and doing better for ourselves. As the world undergoes a profound shift in how we live, work, and play, what are you doing to remain relevant so you don’t become the next Blockbuster?