Why AI Adoption Fails — and How to Fix the Communication

Full transcript

Angus Robertson 00:00
Welcome to Outcome Marketing Live. I'm Angus Robertson and today I'm joined by Patti Sanchez, a communication strategist who's an expert in helping B2B companies say what they mean. Patti, it's great to have you. How have you been?

Patti Sanchez 00:17
Oh, so good. And I'm really thrilled for this conversation. It's always fun to talk with you, Angus, and with the Outcome Marketing community, everybody is joining us. Now, I really enjoyed working with you. You have great insights, obviously, into personas and communication strategy.

Angus Robertson 00:42
Well, thanks for that. And I also very much enjoyed working with you. And I'm really energized, too, by our topic today and the kind of work that I think you and I have both been doing in the AI space. Absolutely. Well, let's get started. Can you tell me a little bit about your journey? I know you're very passionate about communications. Where did that passion come from and what's happened over your journey? Have there been any key learnings or any surprises along the way?

Patti Sanchez 01:13
Well, probably like a lot of people, my journey started in childhood. I grew up surrounded by storytellers. My mom was a champion debater in high school and college. My dad was a radio and television engineer, but he became a salesperson, sort of moved up in the organization. And so our house was filled with conversation and debate and stories. And I was the youngest of five and my siblings were all older than me. And so basically I had to get good at communicating to hold the floor, so to speak. It was a great training ground. And then that really carried over into my work here in Silicon Valley, which I've been living in and working in for decades. And I think that's where I really started to discover the importance of communication in helping technology take hold.

Angus Robertson 02:06
You said something which I think is really interesting and really challenging and also appears very simple at the same time. You use the word story. And for as long as there's been human history, we've been captivated by a good story. So at the same time, my career has been mostly in B2B marketing and we're generally pretty bad at telling good stories. Do you have any insights over the years? And as you've looked into some of the criteria or what makes a great story, anything that comes to mind?

Patti Sanchez 02:48
Well, sure. Any story nerd will tell you there are particular characteristics that a great story has. It starts with structure and understanding three-act structure and how to organize your points into that compelling arc. And there are a lot of other nerdy things we can tell you about how to create drama and emotional interest. But I think the core of a great story and great communication is the audience — understanding who you're talking to, what motivates them, and connecting with them on that human level, which to me is even more important than ever now.

Angus Robertson 03:27
Yeah, that's a very good point. There is so much noise now about AI. And of course, you being in the Bay Area, working with a lot of tech companies, automation has been part of the lexicon for some time, but with AI, we just take it to a whole new level. So how do you navigate that? When you're looking at all this noise and all this increased automation, does the story get lost?

Patti Sanchez 04:01
Well, a certain story gets lost, in my opinion — the story of the people who are impacted by AI. In Silicon Valley and business in general, leaders tend to focus when they're communicating about any kind of change, and that includes rolling out a new technology like AI, on the business value. And I get it. That's the main motivator for the executive team to adopt anything. It's what investors care about. It's what the board cares about. But when it comes to everyday employees, what they care about is the impact on them. And that is the failing, I think, of a lot of change communication — not understanding that people need to hear a different story than what you want to tell. The kind of story that motivates you as a leader is different than the kind of story that motivates your people.

Angus Robertson 05:03
Why do you think that keeps getting repeated? It seems so obvious when you say it, but in the moment, we're talking about things that we think sound good to us as an audience, but may completely alienate who we're actually trying to engage in the change management or the future direction that the company is prioritizing.

Patti Sanchez 05:27
I think there are a couple of reasons. There's a process reason, which is that it's hard. It takes time. It feels like it slows you down to stop and analyze your various stakeholders, figure out what you need to say, and then do the work of translating your messaging, your story to what each of those audiences needs. But AI, technology, automation makes that a lot easier than it used to be. When I got started in marketing, that was a very manual process. So you had a really good argument for not doing it because we can't afford it. Now that argument has largely been taken away. So there's a process reason, but there's also a human reason — sadly, I think we tend to be self-centered. We tend to live inside our own heads. We first think about ourselves and what matters to us, and we assume that that matters to others. So a lot of my work is to hold up a mirror to the organization and say, here's what I see you're doing that's not working, and to be a translator so that the organization can better understand what its audiences need and really cross that chasm.

Angus Robertson 06:55
And do you find for communicators or managers or leaders, is there any checklist or reminders or programming they can think about? For the folks who really do want to figure out how to engage that audience and meet them where they are, how do you make sure you don't forget that when there's so much going on and so much to get done?

Patti Sanchez 07:18
Yeah. Well, checklists, templates, and things like that can help marketers. We have tools like personas to remind ourselves and to consider the other's perspective. And we have workflows that start with that audience persona many times when we're doing planning or creating messaging. For executives or anybody who's crafting communication or standing in front of an audience, I think the other hack is to remember that your goal is to change how they think and behave by the time you're done communicating. It's not to serve yourself as much as it may feel like that. If you remember that your audience is there to be moved, then that helps you start from a place of thinking about what they need to hear before you open your mouth.

Angus Robertson 08:16
Well, I know you're passionate and you spend time, as you mentioned, working and thinking about personas. And many of us are figuring out where we go with AI. There's some challenges, some uncertainty, some fear, but then there's also a very powerful set of tools that can be used to enhance the work that we do. You've been working with AI and personas. Why are you doing that kind of work and what are you seeing?

Patti Sanchez 08:45
Yeah. Well, it's really motivated by constraints. I do believe in talking to real life human beings when you're trying to understand an audience and craft a message or a narrative that's going to persuade them. But you don't always have the time and money to do that original research. And so the synthetic personas that I'm working on creating right now are a way of supplementing that primary research. I don't think it removes that entirely because AI only knows what we've taught it and it doesn't understand the whole real world experience of every human. So it will miss things, but it's helpful as a supplement. The way I'm using it right now is I did some focus groups with real life humans for a client and now I need to propose how my client might change their messaging based on what those humans would think, but we can't afford to go out and do another round of focus groups. So I'm creating personas based on the findings of the original focus groups and feeding them the transcripts and other notes about what this persona wants. And then I'm using those as a first reaction to revised messaging.

Angus Robertson 10:23
So personas have historically been these flat documents that get put together once and then lost. What to you makes a good persona? Because earlier we were talking about engaging the audience and moving the audience. So what are the elements that you want to capture to ensure that you have a persona that reflects how to move them?

Patti Sanchez 10:53
Yeah, well, there's the expected things — the demographics, their role, responsibilities, all of that behavioral information. But it's also really important to add the layer of the psychographics and fears, motivators, emotional responses to the work, but also to the world. So in these focus groups that I did recently, I asked questions about hobbies. What do these people do in their hours away from work? And I learned so much about them and their kind of interwiring that is informing the strategy for marketing to them, because now we understand better that they really identify as makers. And that the time away from the desk doing analog activities — in this case they were architects — actually shapes their daily work. And now we have ideas about sponsorships, collaborations that I don't think we would have arrived at if we hadn't asked those questions to better draw a complete picture of who they are as humans, not just as buyers.

Angus Robertson 12:03
Yeah, you're not going to engage someone unless you understand who they are as a human. So you're taking that flat document into something that's actually a little bit more dynamic with these synthetic personas that you've been working on. What's been your experience so far? What's worked? What hasn't worked? Does it provide a benefit to your work?

Patti Sanchez 12:37
So far I'm early in it, and it is taking more work than I expected to get the quality of insight back out of it that I was hoping for. And I think that's because — you mentioned in a LinkedIn post about this conversation — it's about context. The AI only knows what it's originally trained on, but you need to give it context related to your project, your program, the product, etc. But if you give it too much, it gets overwhelmed and might reference the wrong thing, and if you give it too little, it may hallucinate. And so that is the art, I think. And it's not just prompt engineering, it's also in some ways weirdly world building, which is something that storytellers do. You really need to imagine how this person, this synthetic person, might live their life and what informs their decisions — and that's the kind of context you need to give the AI. In this case I'm using a Claude project, which is really rudimentary. I know there are much more sophisticated ways to do it, but I'm dipping my toe in the shallow end and just experimenting, and it's fun.

Angus Robertson 14:02
Okay. And do you see potential here versus what we've historically done as marketers creating that document that we reference from time to time?

Patti Sanchez 14:10
Absolutely. And as more robust avatars — I think when we create humanoid versions of our buyers that move and speak, that exist — that technology exists, so it's possible. I think it may help us empathize more with those people. The more realistic that representation is. But I still do not advocate using this to replace conversations with real life human beings. I see it more as a supplement, which is honestly how I think anybody should be thinking about AI in general. It's a tool to augment your capabilities, not to replace them.

Angus Robertson 14:49
And you talked about the psychographics being an important part of constructing a worthwhile persona to reference — motivators, fears, for example. One of the interesting arcs that we're seeing is this presentation of new technology with AI. We've seen this in the past with new technologies like the internet, and also the idea of change is always something that many of us are concerned about or uncertain about. And with AI, things just moving so quickly where the capabilities can change from week to week, and of course you have these leaders in the space who are raising money to get these trillion dollar valuations, talking about how whole industries are just going to disappear. Now we're starting to see this narrative shift where there's quite some concern, fear, people starting to resist and push back with AI, where a lot of executives have made this just a mandate, a company-wide priority while at the same time potentially laying off a bunch of people. When you look at all of this that is happening, what's your perspective and how is this affecting some of the organizations you work with?

Patti Sanchez 16:50
So much in that question. First I want to acknowledge that this is a movie we've seen before in some ways, working in Silicon Valley — when the internet erupted, when smartphones came on the scene, when Y2K happened. I've lived through these cycles many times before and the Gartner hype cycle exists for a reason because this is a predictable pattern that organizations follow when they're chasing something new and the vendors are hyping it and everybody's jumping on the bandwagon without really raising serious questions and then reality sets in when you start to experiment with it and it's not everything it's cracked up to be. So that's all true and that experience we can use to inform how we communicate — hey, don't oversell it because you know there will be flaws. That's a mistake I think a lot of leaders made early on with AI, promoted it like a panacea and employees know better.

Patti Sanchez 18:14
But there's something different here, which is that the technology is moving really quickly, but it also is more deeply disruptive — not just to our organizations and our workflows, but to our identities. And that's what is stirring the deeper resistance maybe that we haven't seen with other technologies. I collaborated with an industrial psychologist and a change management expert on a study that we launched the results of at a change management conference just a couple months ago. It was 24 interviews with leaders and executive coaches and the number one barrier to AI adoption is fear according to them. But why? I think there's a sense of threat to not just our way of working, but our sense of who we are. And that rocks people to their core. On the simplest level, what you're seeing a lot of times in that fear reaction is an amygdala hijack. When people are up against a wall, feeling a lot of pressure and having to react quickly without all the information, they're going to see what you're trying to feed them as a threat — like a tiger that wants to eat them. So you have to understand that and then consciously try to counter that amygdala hijack by making people less afraid and instead engaging their curiosity, which is the antidote to fight or flight. It's the approach instinct. And actually story can help with that.

Angus Robertson 20:21
Now that's really powerful. Executives and leaders have multiple stakeholders — whether you're a manager or an executive, you have bosses, whether they're investors or the board or senior management. There's also customers and prospects. And then of course, employees need to feel engaged and part of the solution to help make that change real. What are you seeing in general that doesn't work? And do you have advice for how to shift the approach to make it feel there's less tigers in the room, perhaps?

Patti Sanchez 21:25
Yeah. Well, what isn't working is a top-down mandate without context or without the story that makes that mandate meaningful to the people. A lot of times when leaders communicate about a change like this, they'll explain the why for the change in the context of the business. But you also need to translate that down to each level of the organization — why is it good for this business unit? Why is it good for this function? Why is it good for these individuals and these roles? That feels like it takes a lot of work and time. And some leaders might be tempted to say, well, you're either for me or you're against me. But there are more people who are going to be in that middle and they are more movable, but they will only be moved if you give them a good reason that they can relate to. So it's translating the why to their individual situations. And that's what your managers can help with. Make that their job. You need to translate it for them too, why your manager should buy in and help you make this possible. But then they can translate it for their teams and give them some flexibility and latitude to do that in a way that makes sense for the people that they manage.

Angus Robertson 22:54
Wow. I was just reading about one of the larger companies in the Bay Area and how they have a new AI unit and picking some of their top people to be part of the AI unit. And if you don't want to be part of it, then you can leave. Maybe that's not the best example of how to support that.

Patti Sanchez 23:19
Well, why isn't it? I mean, I understand the rationale and I've been a leader and it's frustrating when you feel like people are constantly putting up blocks and you're trying to get something done. But what you will fail to do is get people to give their discretionary effort. You might get compliance, 90 to 100% of effort so they can keep their jobs, but you're not going to get 110, 115, 120%, which is what you really need when you're inventing, when you're exploring new territory. You want people to be excited about it. So it comes back to what I was saying earlier about overcoming the fight or flight response and engaging in the approach response, which takes communication that makes people want to try something new. You have to spark their curiosity. And an old way of talking about that is the power of possibility. Instead of saying this is what it will do for us, engage people in imagining what it could do for them. And I think we talked about this in our prep call — I believe strongly that if you reframe the conversation and make it a creative, imaginative, interactive conversation, when you see that people are stuck or ask them to co-create with you a better answer to the situation, well, how might we? What if I could give you one more person to do the work you're trying to do? The AI could be that one person, but it could also be five people if we're using agentic AI. What could you do with five more people? And I think at the root, that's basically saying that AI isn't about replacing, it's about augmenting. And I have seen in working with organizations talking about AI that that gets people more interested and more motivated than the alternative — we're going to use it to cut costs.

Angus Robertson 25:34
I can imagine how that can be a lot more effective where you paint the vision of this future and the relevance of the company in the future, but how these people, this team, this organization is needed to help make that happen and how they can have more resources and more capabilities to support that happening, which helps them grow and be more capable. And so they're feeling perhaps a little more safe and also that they're going to get something out of this process as they invest into it.

Patti Sanchez 26:18
Yeah, that's right. And I've seen that approach work many times over in crafting communication. I've seen it work with myself too. And I think that's really important — when you're communicating change, include yourself in the conversation and share your own experience. That's another finding of this study that my psychologist and change manager friend and I did together. The number one motivator was modeling by leaders, along with creating a culture of experimentation that really invites people to try and play and fail without fear. But people will follow the leader who is honest about where they failed before. The same applies to AI. So talk about how you're using it. Don't just be preaching about how other people are the problem and should be transforming their own workflows. What about you?

Angus Robertson 27:18
Well, Patti, this has been a phenomenal conversation. It's moved quickly through our 30 minutes or so. I wish it could go longer. I really appreciate you sharing your insights. As you think about our audience and the leaders in the audience or the employees, individual contributors that are involved in this change, do you have any advice or guidance for them and how they navigate?

Patti Sanchez 27:50
Well, yeah, I think the first is — think about the people you're trying to bring along with you and figure out one thing that would be important to them. One goal they have that the initiative you're trying to get adopted can help them achieve. So start with your audience, know what matters to them, and pick one thing you can frame this around that will make them feel like they're winning too. And then be transparent about what you know, what you don't know, what's working, what isn't. And stories are a great way to communicate that information from your own experience, but also from your organization's experience. Have people stand up and tell stories about what they've been trying, what's worked, what hasn't worked, because that will be more memorable to people and more trustworthy because it's specific and it's a real human's experience.

Angus Robertson 28:52
Great. That sounds like very good advice. And if folks want to get in touch with you, perhaps engage with you for your consulting around great communications or perhaps your book, I know you've got some literature out there, how do people do that?

Patti Sanchez 29:14
Well, I welcome anyone reaching out to me on LinkedIn. I accept nearly every invitation unless you're trying to sell me something — especially if you wrote AI bot, I want to talk to a real person. And the other is you can go to my website, which is patti, P-A-T-T-I, san.com. And what you'll find there is some information about my capabilities and the stuff that I do and of course some resources, things that I published in the past.

Angus Robertson 29:46
Well, thank you again, Patti. And for anybody interested in moving their audiences and engaging their audiences and understanding the psychographics and creating those stories to make that happen through change, please reach out to Patti. It's been a wonderful conversation and thank you for joining this Outcome Marketing Live.

Patti Sanchez 30:06
Thank you. Have so much fun. I love what you're up to, Angus.