Media and Speaking
Book an Operator, Not a Futurist.
Most AI talks are a slide deck of predictions from someone who has never had to fix the thing at 2am. I give your audience the version that holds up on Monday morning: what this technology actually does, what it does not, and what to do about it before the next vendor walks through the door.
What your audience gets
Nobody leaves with homework they will not do.
The test I hold myself to is simple. A week after the room empties, can somebody who was in it point at one thing they changed? If the answer is no, the talk was entertainment.
So every session ends with the audience holding something concrete: the questions to ask a vendor, the order to fix things in, the one process worth documenting first. I would rather send people home with three things they will actually do than thirty they will not.
I also do not sell from the stage. If somebody wants to work with me afterward they know where to find me, but the talk is the talk. Organizers have been burned by that often enough to ask, so I say it up front.
Six talks
Pick the one that fits your room.
Each of these can run as a thirty minute keynote or open out into a half-day workshop. I will also build something specific to your audience if none of them land squarely.
Most People Selling You AI Started in 2023
A field guide to telling a working system from a convincing demo. What breaks, what it costs when it breaks, and the questions that make a vendor either prove it or leave.
Leaves with: a vendor question list they can use that week.
The Pattern and the Painting
Every business contains work that can be reproduced by anyone and work that only the owner can do. Automate the first, protect the second. Most owners have them exactly backwards and it is why they cannot take a week off.
Leaves with: their own work sorted into the two piles.
Your AI Does Not Have to Live in Someone Else's Cloud
For rooms full of people who were told AI is off the table because of what they hold. What on-premises AI genuinely costs, what it can and cannot do yet, and how to tell which of your use cases justify the hardware.
Leaves with: a straight answer on whether it applies to them.
The Business That Runs Without You
Getting what is in your head onto paper, in the right order, without stopping the business to do it. The sequence matters more than the tooling, and almost everyone starts in the wrong place.
Leaves with: the first process to document, chosen.
Nobody Was Coming
Self-education as an operating system rather than a personality trait. For rooms that need permission more than they need tactics, and for anyone who has been waiting to be picked.
Leaves with: a reason to stop waiting.
Funding Denied
Why owners find out about their credit at the exact moment they can least afford to, and what the twelve months before you need money should look like.
Leaves with: what to check this month, not next year.
Formats
However your event is shaped.
Keynote
Thirty to sixty minutes, with time for questions. One topic, taken far enough to be useful.
Workshop
Half or full day, capped at a size where I can get to everyone. People work on their own business, not a case study.
Panel
Happy to be the one on the panel who disagrees. I will not pretend a technology is further along than it is.
Podcast or webinar
Remote, any platform. I come with topics prepared but I would rather follow a real conversation.
Who these rooms usually are
Owners and operators, not an audience of engineers.
The talks are built for people who run something and have to make decisions about technology without being technologists. That is a harder room than a technical one, and a more interesting one.
If your group sits outside this list and the topics still fit, say so. The sorting that matters is whether the audience has to make operational decisions, not what industry they are in.
- Chambers of commerce and small business associations
- Insurance agency groups and networks
- MSP and IT service provider communities
- Staffing and recruiting associations
- Property management organizations
- Entrepreneur and founder groups
- Trade associations running member education
- Nonprofit and community organizations
Community events
If you are a nonprofit, ask anyway.
I speak for nonprofits and community organizations at reduced rates, and sometimes at no charge, depending on the scope and what the group can carry. The same is true of the build work we do. It is not a marketing program and there is no form for it.
Rural and remote groups in particular: I am in Trinity County, I know what it is like to be the last place anybody schedules, and I will make the drive or dial in.
For organizers
Everything you need to promote it.
Headshots, logo files, written bios at a few different lengths, video clips and the one-sheet all live on the press kit, so your marketing team can pull what they need without going through me.
What I need from you
- Who is in the room and what they came for
- Slot length and whether there is a question period
- Whether you want slides or just me and a microphone
- Recording and photography permissions, either way is fine
For remote sessions I run my own camera, lighting and audio, so nothing depends on your platform's defaults.
Booking
Tell me about the room and I will tell you what I would do with it.
Date, audience, format, and roughly how long you want. You will get a straight answer on availability and which of the six topics I think fits your group, including if the answer is that I am not the right speaker.