AI in Finance: Governance, Risk, and the Human Element with Gianne James

Khullani Abdullahi (00:01.122) Hello, and welcome to the AI in Chicago podcast. I'm your host, Khullani Abdullahi. I'm the founder of Techné AI and board site AI governance, risk, and compliance strategy firm based here in Chicago. I'm so excited and pleased to have with me today, John James, my guest. John James holds a distinguished academic background across business law and social impact. Gianne James (00:14.893) you Khullani Abdullahi (00:29.74) She is currently finalizing her Master of Business Administration from North University's Kellogg School of Management, one of the top nations, top business schools where she's further honing her strategy and leadership skills. She recently completed a Master of Jurisprudence from Loyola University, Chicago School of Law. While at Loyola, Jean focused her research on the legal implications of artificial intelligence and her thesis was around creating a new liability landscape. and helping people prepare for artificial intelligence ubiquitous throughout society. She examined in particular how we should modernize existing liability frameworks for AI. Earlier in her career, Jean completed the Impact Leadership Development Program at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. There she deepened her expertise in equity negotiation and strategic leadership. Finally, she also holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Spelman College. Her academic journey is complemented by deep skills in data privacy, cybersecurity, corporate compliance, risk management, and the growing legal landscape around artificial intelligence and business. Currently, she is the senior vice president of governance and assurance at First Insurance Funding, one of the largest premium finance companies in North America. And as you know, I have a focus on Illinois. It's also headquartered in Northbrook, Illinois, and has been operating for decades. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wintrust Financial Corporation. Welcome, Jean James. Gianne James (02:02.72) Thank you, thank you so much for having me. Khullani Abdullahi (02:05.902) I'm so excited to dig in. There is a significant amount of excitement, trepidation, fear, uncertainty, risks, liability emerging, already emerged in this space, especially when it comes to AI in the financial services firms. I'd love for you to kind of take a step back and reflect on your career. and your journey and your education and let us walk us through that journey and how you arrived to be the vice president, senior vice president of governance and insurance working at the intersection of AI in a very regulated sector with finance and what trends you saw that allowed you to preemptively enter this arena. while companies are still scrambling to identify who their AI experts and leaders are in a lot of fields. What did you see and how did your education and your work journey shape? Gianne James (03:13.014) Sure, yeah. So I have been with First Insurance Funding for 18 years this past July. know, premium finance is a niche lending product that not many people know about. So I stumbled upon it myself. I started off doing some loan origination, credit underwriting. Khullani Abdullahi (03:32.174) Mm-hmm. Gianne James (03:38.381) And then I transitioned into working on some custom programs and payment solutions that really were tech forward. So a lot of insurance companies are very antiquated in their payment processes. And so my help or our services helped integrate some more streamlined solutions. my tech. interests started sparking during that season of my career. I later transitioned out of that role and wound up in Governance and Assurance, which was a department that I had the opportunity to build from the ground up. And so it helped us as a business unit focus all of our risk management compliance. Khullani Abdullahi (04:10.371) Yes. Gianne James (04:32.864) and quality assurance functions under one heading. And because I had such a deep background in premium finance and the financial services side, I was still relatively new in the compliance and risk management space, at least in the formal sense of compliance and risk management. So I decided to go back to school. And so I enrolled at Loyola in that program. And it was during my time, about halfway through the program, where I, just, it was that time when you just started hearing more and more and more about the use of AI. And I remember, it was just like one of those aha moments where, I was like, A, this is really scary, but B, how many people truly understand what the impact of AI is going to be as an individual? And then it was another aha, was like, what are companies going to do? Like, this is not something you just plop and let it run. Like you have to be very intentional. Khullani Abdullahi (05:33.122) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (05:50.766) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (05:56.813) Right. Gianne James (05:59.571) about how you're implementing it, and even embracing or understanding the shifts and the levels of adoption that are within your employee base and your customer base. Because so many people have just either zero knowledge of what AI is, or they're scared of it. Khullani Abdullahi (06:15.587) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (06:22.872) Right? Gianne James (06:27.658) or they're ready to embrace it and they've jumped off and used chat GPT for everything in the world. So, yes, unfortunately, right? So there's a lot of peril and promise. I think that's something we've heard about across AI conversations. And so, Khullani Abdullahi (06:32.992) including companies proprietary information. Gianne James (06:55.378) At that point, was like, either I'm getting this compliance and enterprise risk management degree. AI is something that's right on the helm. I don't have a traditional tech background. I didn't have a computer science undergrad or anything like that. I said, okay, how can I differentiate myself? What can I do? so kind of in between semesters. Khullani Abdullahi (07:16.75) Right. Right. Gianne James (07:22.6) I crammed for the AI governance professional certification that's offered through IAPP. And I was one of a handful of people that got it in early late April or early May, one of the two, but it was something that I was adamant about doing. I put my head down, studied for it and then it was kind of like a waiting game because every role out there was for technologists and those that, you know, built AI models. And so I got a little discouraged, you know, but I think what people are starting to realize now is that AI is not solely a tech function because it impacts every Khullani Abdullahi (07:52.919) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (07:58.381) right. Khullani Abdullahi (08:03.34) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (08:06.627) Bye. Khullani Abdullahi (08:16.875) Yes. Gianne James (08:18.704) aspect of the business, you need someone who understands those phases. My background in operations helps me do that. Pivoting to risk management and compliance further informs, okay, this is the layer of compliance and how it feeds into our operations. So it's like, I started putting those pieces together and now... Khullani Abdullahi (08:27.533) Right. Gianne James (08:44.364) I'm starting to see, yeah, they're starting to put those pieces together. So, yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (08:45.26) The market has caught up. Yes, thank you for sharing that because I think I host a series of AI breakfasts that are principally attended. I would say one of the biggest cohorts that attends is PhD students in machine learning or master's students in AI or computer science. And there is a lot of uncertainty for those who are coming from the humanities or law or operations or strategy about what their role in the AI age is. And so I love the statement that you made, is not every AI role is technical. AI in general isn't just for technologists who are building the models, right? The engineers, the data scientists and machine learning engineers in particular, Gianne James (09:27.052) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (09:43.722) all really, really important, all very, very valuable, but the business and strategy functions have not gone away. Those are still there and they're still needed. So when people ask the question, and I think this is an important point to highlight for our listeners, particularly those who are earlier in their career who are figuring out what this means for their career trajectory, like you took your existing domain expertise and then you layered on Gianne James (09:50.237) Exactly. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (10:13.302) expertise for AI where it intersected with the work that you were already doing. And so you didn't abandon your economics background, your operations, your finance. You didn't abandon all of that. What you did was start layering on a new domain of expertise. Gianne James (10:18.771) Exactly. Exactly. Gianne James (10:26.207) Exactly. Khullani Abdullahi (10:35.04) around AI at the intersection of governance and risk in finance. So those are three intersections. And in the old Silicon Valley, before they lost their damn mind, they used to this really great concept where they talked about differentiating yourself by niching down. So the question when you ask is, how many professionals out there have nearly 20 years of experience in finance, operations, strategy? Gianne James (10:39.656) Exactly. Yeah. Gianne James (10:55.02) Mm. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (11:04.822) and now have these governance, risk and AI certifications and master's degrees and this MBA in finance. And there's five people in the world, So first, congratulations on masterfully executing that because as an AI strategist, I don't know how I'm going to replace that. I don't have a model that does what you do. I don't have an app, right? Like, so as we think about career longevity. Gianne James (11:11.038) Yes. Gianne James (11:15.052) you Gianne James (11:33.77) Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (11:34.774) As we think about career relevance and as we think about how you position yourself as a professional in the market, talk to me a little bit about how that kind of thinking is shaping the strategic choices you're making, both internally at first insurance, like what are you doing with your team? How important is upskilling, enablement, and education? How are you making time for it? How do you encourage other leaders? to help make time for it. Because that kind of masterful execution at those intersections takes time, energy, money, dedication, and a huge emphasis on learning and upskilling and enablement, which every company right now is trying to figure out how do we do that. So what does it take for a company to create space for an employee to do what you've done over these 18 years at First Insurance? And what has made you stay for two decades? Nobody stays at companies. for two decades. So what is unique about the company, the culture? Let's dive into that. Gianne James (12:38.06) Okay, yeah, so I would say first off, my experience with First Insurance Funding, it's been an incredibly entrepreneurial space. you, I started obviously two decades ago, nearly, and in the roles that I was in, I wore multiple hats. You know, you, my peers. Khullani Abdullahi (12:50.784) Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (12:59.992) Mm-hmm. Gianne James (13:04.876) the people that I say I quote unquote grew up with at the company, we were always putting our heads together. How do we solve this? How do we do that? know, the riddle or the quote that, know, jack of all trades, master of none. But I think the completed quote is, you know, is better than a master of one, you know? And so, Khullani Abdullahi (13:08.664) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (13:13.486) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (13:32.15) Yes. Gianne James (13:34.849) having these kind of multiple hats that I've had to wear, having the opportunity to raise my hand for projects or even pick out a project and say, is broken, let me show you how I think it should be fixed. I think all of those things have really stayed with me and allowed me to reimagine what something Khullani Abdullahi (13:50.53) Yes. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (13:59.118) Great. Gianne James (14:03.932) what certain frameworks should look like or just better ways of how we can execute on certain functions. so once I got the AI certification, once I wrote my thesis, my master's thesis, I immediately started putting those frameworks on my business, on what we were doing on a day-to-day basis. And so in that space and time between degrees and semesters and quarter. Khullani Abdullahi (14:41.292) which is like four weeks, right? Like you keep saying in between semesters. It's been a long time since I was school, but that's like winter. That's not Thanksgiving to New Year's. That's the space between semester and like August, like it's four to six weeks. I mean, okay, let me not interrupt. They say podcasts hosts are not supposed to talk a lot. So let me stop. Gianne James (14:43.02) Thank Gianne James (14:56.065) It's... Gianne James (15:05.256) gosh, yeah, so yeah, in between these like pockets of time, I would just shove in as much, you know, AI knowledge as I could. And as you know, like the scene is rapidly changing. Like if you miss a week, you've missed a lot, a lot. And so it's... Khullani Abdullahi (15:13.578) Yeah. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (15:27.052) You were behind. Yes. Gianne James (15:33.997) So I'm kind of pivoting, but this is why it cannot just be the technology side that's paying attention to these things. They're busy creating the models. They're busy testing the models, but there's this whole other space of these tentative laws, these tentative regulations. And now we see with the president's AI action plan for the U.S. Khullani Abdullahi (15:47.319) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (15:53.101) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (16:01.73) Mm-hmm. Gianne James (16:02.902) There's also this attempt to deregulate AI in a push for innovation, which is a whole nother topic. And if we have time, we can go down that path. But this is not one person's job. This is not just an IT role. so having that experience and having and seeing and working through projects, not only inside our company, but with other vendors, it's like this will splinter quickly if you don't have the right hands and minds in place who are prepared to take on these types of. Khullani Abdullahi (16:39.17) Right. Gianne James (16:57.084) evolving roles and evolving rules and you're like you're building the airplane as you fly. That really is what it is. There's no, no. Khullani Abdullahi (17:06.614) Yes. And there's no pilot in the airplane. There's no accredited, certified pilot with 30 years of experience. And everybody has three years of experience. Yeah. Gianne James (17:16.678) No, exactly. And you see that even in the job postings. It's like they want this much experience. And if you don't have that, especially if you're not on the technical side, like you're not even being considered, which is, we'll see how that goes. know, like it, yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (17:23.118) Yeah. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (17:30.144) Yes. Right. Khullani Abdullahi (17:37.182) Yes, it's not going to go very well because there's not enough. There still needs to be someone who connects the business functions to like this new framework that is being adopted because it's not just in the products. It's in how you deliver services. It's in how your employees. Gianne James (17:46.124) correct. Gianne James (17:54.219) right. Khullani Abdullahi (17:56.812) deliver value, it's in the value chain, it's in the risk continuum, it goes from the board down to your external customers. I mean, it's very much infrastructure, but with so much risk that it's, I really think of it as, like you've been in this role at first. Gianne James (17:57.939) Exactly. Exactly. Right. Khullani Abdullahi (18:19.256) for 18 years. So you've seen predictive analytics come through. You've seen IOT. You've seen big data. You've seen those shift to the cloud. I'm sure you were there when they were still had servers on premises in suburban Illinois, right? I'm assuming most of it is in the cloud now and you don't have servers. So you've seen these like significant technology shifts. Does AI feel different to you and how or why? Gianne James (18:23.402) Right. Yes. Gianne James (18:30.283) Right. Gianne James (18:35.019) yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Gianne James (18:49.01) It does because a lot of those things, a lot of like the moving to the cloud, like that was an IT project, right? We just knew, okay, here are your credentials. Here's the new link, you know, go, you know, test it, make sure it works. do what you normally do. the, the fact is that AI is learning from us. Khullani Abdullahi (18:50.146) Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (19:00.256) Hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (19:04.682) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (19:18.243) Yeah. Gianne James (19:18.386) It's being fed data, know, unsupervised learning and all that, we'll recognize patterns and those types of things. But when we're talking about decision-making models or give these results based on these prompts, that's when it's the expert that's sitting in the chair that knows how the business works, that knows how... what their customers are likely to phrase something as. Like in our space, so we are direct customers in a premium finance world, our insurance agents. Khullani Abdullahi (19:59.565) Okay. Gianne James (20:01.002) Their terminology is not banking terminology. How they put in a prompt is not going to be how a traditional banking customer puts in a prompt. So the person in the seat is the one with the five plus years of experience, but may not have ever dealt with AI a day in their life. But they've been on the phone with them. They've been on the phone with the customer. They've been on the phone with the insureds. Khullani Abdullahi (20:05.312) interesting. Khullani Abdullahi (20:25.388) Yes. Yes. Gianne James (20:30.976) They've been on the phone with carriers and MGA's. They know what all that means. AI won't know it until we tell them this is what it means in our framework. And this is when you pull this data down, you have to organize it this way because this is what's going to make sense to the end user. So, you know, it's, it's like, yes, IT has to help us tell the machines how to do it, but we're the ones telling them what needs to happen. Khullani Abdullahi (21:00.511) what needs to be done. Gianne James (21:00.628) And we're the ones that are going to be responsible for testing it, managing it for model drift and hallucinations and. Khullani Abdullahi (21:04.182) right. Khullani Abdullahi (21:08.078) Right? Right. Because the expertise is in the human who does, and they have the knowledge, they have the intuition, they have the gut instinct. And you look and you say, I don't know why that's wrong, but that output is incorrect. But I can go find out why it's wrong, right? Yeah. Gianne James (21:13.479) Exactly. Gianne James (21:19.574) Right. Gianne James (21:24.232) Yes, yes, exactly. And so that's where it goes into the model transparency. you need to have your users need to understand at a basic level how these models are put together, what they're connected to. And so my personal theory is like when we're operationalizing and implementing these AI tools, the people that should be using them are those who have a depth of experience already. I don't think an entry-level person that's coming into your business brand new should be leveraging AI in the sense that they would not Khullani Abdullahi (22:07.114) That's interesting. Yeah. Gianne James (22:22.218) be able to tell if the AI is right or wrong. So they don't, yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (22:26.254) They just don't have enough of a foundation yet. They can use it to develop the foundation and learn, et cetera. But when it comes to mission critical decisions or outputs that go directly to clients, they don't have the ability to say, okay, I'm just gonna copy and paste. Yeah. So that gives... Gianne James (22:33.354) Yes. Gianne James (22:41.237) Yes. Gianne James (22:45.49) Exactly. Exactly. And that's where the operational risk comes in. Like if, if that's a decision that you make, you need to understand that the impact of this is now not the machine, it's the person behind it. And so that's where you get into these liability framework issues because everybody's well, whose fault is it? Well, employees are still agents of their employer. So. Khullani Abdullahi (23:10.401) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (23:14.114) Yeah. Gianne James (23:16.46) at the, you know, when you're talking about whose fault it is, ultimately it's the employer's fault, you know, because you're entrusting your employee, your agent, to act on your best behalf. And so when they don't do that, now you are open to, you know, errors and emissions, you know, claims. And, you know, in some cases, will attorneys be able to slap on? Khullani Abdullahi (23:27.074) Yep. Yep. Khullani Abdullahi (23:37.25) Yeah. Gianne James (23:44.941) product liability claims, depending upon how that AI system is used. Was there a human in the loop? Human in the loop is not a solve for everything. So you have to understand who's the human in the loop? How were they trained? How do they understand, I should say, how AI literate are they? Khullani Abdullahi (23:58.232) Right. Gianne James (24:14.668) What is your training that you've been able to demonstrate? These are the types of things that are going to come up in lawsuits when they're trying to prove negligence or when some other means of restitution in the event of harm by an employer that's leveraging AI or an AI product service. Khullani Abdullahi (24:44.908) I'm glad that you shared that because what I'm hearing is employers and companies in general are rushing towards developing a coherent or incoherent, just some AI strategy. How are we using AI to enable employees? How are we using AI to drive? Gianne James (24:59.727) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (25:04.64) efficiencies, how are we optimizing workflows? How are we reducing headcount? Some CEOs are asking that explicitly. How are we embedding it in products or developing new products? How are we developing new revenue models? So all of those questions are being asked. But I think what you just shared is the importance of having a risk and governance model drive internal and external adoption and development of AI. So explicit, I'll ask you very explicitly at your work, in your current role, at your current organization, what does that look like on the ground? You're a premium finance organization, highly regulated, but quite innovative, right? Some early adoption of AI and some of these other technologies, what does it mean on the ground? Are you working with product? you working with legal? Where is the risk and governance intersecting with business strategy, with IT strategy, with product development strategy, with customer success and service? How does that manifest on the ground? And then what are you particularly proud of that you guys do well? And why do you think that you guys are able to do it well? Because I think most organizations are struggling with how they operationalize governance and risk in the world of AI strategy and development. Gianne James (26:40.054) Sure, yeah. So WinTrust overall has just recently brought on a director of AI, or we're in the process of it has informally been announced who that individual is. However, in the process of that kind of ongoing process or hiring process is, you know, we've Khullani Abdullahi (26:52.354) Okay. Gianne James (27:09.376) been inventorying different AI use cases that are coming from the business. So the business units are saying, this is how we would like to use AI. There's also an evaluation of the vendors that we have today who have an AI component to their software or services or SaaS models, I should say. Khullani Abdullahi (27:29.805) Right. Gianne James (27:38.349) And so, Winters has always taken a very conservative approach to how we conduct business. Like we are just very cognizant of the potential impact it could have to our customers as a community focused institution. The last thing we would want to do is something that would harm Khullani Abdullahi (27:49.678) Right. Gianne James (28:06.888) our customer base. So I can appreciate their thoughtfulness in how they are moving forward with that. So I will say that's a pro in how we're moving things forward. The con is probably similar to what goes on across multiple organizations. It's competing for resources, right? AI is... Khullani Abdullahi (28:34.253) Right. Yeah. Gianne James (28:37.376) going to take a lot of attention. There's a lot of promise. You're talking about efficiency, productivity. You're having employees move from doing what we do kind of like low level tasks to more meaningful work because they can essentially push that off to AI if it's implemented correctly. the productivity and the efficiency and all the things help the case for AI. Where I think you struggle is then what about the initiatives that you have ongoing right now? How do you slot them both? How do you allow for the growth and positioning of both AI and non-AI initiatives at the speed at which you need to move when it comes to AI compared to your competitors. And how do you prioritize those projects? How are you assessing the overall benefit to the organization? when you're stacking it up against projects that have been in the pipeline, maybe for two or three years at this point, because we've just been waiting for our time to come, to where the opportunity and the manpower align. So that is, I think, a big concern across... Khullani Abdullahi (30:25.442) Right. Gianne James (30:35.488) competitors and WinTrust alike is just how do we manage all of this? Gianne James (31:18.282) And so the biggest challenge across not only WinTrust, but even our competitors is the allocation of resources and time. When you're up against existing projects and strategic initiatives, everything is finite. how do you prioritize? How do you? Khullani Abdullahi (31:43.917) Right. Gianne James (31:44.557) properly and reasonably allocate resources to an AI project versus something that's been on a business line's wishlist for the past two years. And they've just been waiting for their slot in the queue. So that is definitely a challenge across, I think all businesses, honestly, it's just resources are finite. Khullani Abdullahi (32:01.602) right from. Khullani Abdullahi (32:11.022) Right. Now you're part of those, yeah, and you're part of those budget conversations, right? You're a senior VP, so you're putting together a budget every year. How do you go about and how would you recommend other similarly situated executives think about the prioritization? How do you frame the ask? Like what metrics and KPIs and ROI value story? narrative and numbers are meaningful in saying, hey, here's my recommendation for how we should allocate. Like what is important and valuable and how are you thinking about those things so that from an audience takeaway standpoint, someone can say, hey, next time I have to go have this conversation and go ask for money and have my meeting with the CFO and the C-suite, this is how I'm putting together my requests. Like what does that look like at your organization and in your role? Gianne James (33:06.732) Sure. So I recently put together a business case for AI governance from the perspective of a risk management view. And one of my recommendations was basically having an enterprise-wide AI strategy that Khullani Abdullahi (33:20.354) Amen. Gianne James (33:35.659) that prioritizes the benefit to the organization, which can be measured in productivity savings, or it could be assessed in the sense that if we don't adopt this, but our competitors have, what is that benefit lost? So kind of weighing not only the internal factors, but also looking at the environment and saying, how do we put ourselves at a competitive disadvantage if we don't do this? And so the recommendation to develop that AI strategy and then essentially score each use case, and based on a number of things, it could be, what's the risk? What's the potential? Khullani Abdullahi (34:25.568) Mm. Gianne James (34:32.758) harm, what's the worst that could happen if this goes rogue. But then also looking at those micro features of this would save us X number of hours and productivity and what the cost to implement. But also looking at, is this a use case that can be replicated across multiple business units? Is it customizable? Is it only applicable to one business unit, so where can you bang for your buck, so to speak. So, you know, taking that framework and then stacking them all up and looking at the scoring is relative to your AI, your overall enterprise AI strategy, in my opinion, is the best way to make sure you're objectively reviewing and looking at Khullani Abdullahi (35:03.029) Right. Gianne James (35:29.524) what your overall needs are, and then where you want to place your dollars. Where do you want to place your investment? So then when you have something like that in place, that's easy to replicate at the business line level, right? Like if we're all measuring it by these factors, Khullani Abdullahi (35:35.403) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (35:39.371) Right. Right. Gianne James (35:58.505) If you do it internally, before you even get to us, you will have, you know, streamlined your list and identify what really will be the most impactful. And then having a library and a common resource or inventory where businesses, business lines across the enterprise have access to, then that allows kind of that innovative, how can I use this for our business unit? Let me see what they've done with this work for us. And then you're kind of able, I'm, I know it's not drag and drop, but there's precedent, right? There's experience. There's, KPI is being measured. As you said, these things are in place so you can understand, okay, is this, is this a model that's worth trying? and once you have, you know, those replicate the more data you have. Khullani Abdullahi (36:37.301) Wait. Khullani Abdullahi (36:42.593) Right. Gianne James (36:56.714) the more analytics you can do and understand how impactful all of these models are. And historically, once you've kind of built that up, now you have data behind your strategy and say, OK, well, this is our history. This is what we've seen work well. This is what we haven't. And then that will later inform where your AI investment goes in the future. Khullani Abdullahi (37:25.547) I love that. Tell me how you are internally at your organization speaking the same language. So one of the things that I see companies struggle with is even the term you use enterprise wide AI strategy feels like an aspiration for most organizations. What I'm seeing is fragmentation, silos, Gianne James (37:49.868) Sure. Khullani Abdullahi (37:55.666) fiefdoms, right, people are heads of divisions. And there's also a lack in many organizations, a lack of a common language that allows people to talk about those trade offs, right. Prioritization requires that we have a common understanding of our scoring methodology, which requires having a common understanding of the company's key goals. You know, Gianne James (37:57.025) Yeah. Gianne James (38:07.115) Right. Gianne James (38:17.59) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (38:24.841) as a corporate entity for the next two or three years. So I have a question about what is AI literacy and enablement level setting, managing up, managing down, stakeholder management, communication, cross-functional collaboration, which are difficult and very vital in a non-AI world. And now you have Gianne James (38:44.213) Yeah. Gianne James (38:49.706) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (38:52.477) the need to develop and execute on and report on an enterprise wide AI strategy. Those traditional business strategy communication functions and functionalities now have to happen in an arena, which I think is just a little bit more difficult and fraught. So. As you, so you've developed this set of recommendations, what are you doing to build consensus? How are you building consensus? What needed to happen before and after? What does that look like in very tactical terms? Is it a lot of emails, a lot of one-on-ones? Are you going to lunch with people? Are you sending them notes on Teams? Like walk us through that process because people know they need to do that. Gianne James (39:35.83) Sure. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (39:38.711) But there's a thousand things that need to happen before that proposal is put in place for approval or denial, right? What did that look like? Gianne James (39:44.402) Right. Right. So it's still ongoing for me. As I mentioned, the director of AI is not yet formally in place. So I've had a lot of one-on-one conversations with people throughout the organization who I've either been pointed to or had prior relationships with just to get an understanding and more background on what they were thinking. Khullani Abdullahi (39:50.253) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (40:08.909) you Gianne James (40:18.346) what is being communicated at this level of the organization that hasn't yet made its way down to this level of the organization. And so, as you would have it while I'm doing this, there is more information coming out. There's presentations and this is how far we've come. This is the phased approach that we're planning to do. And so what that allowed me to do is take my recommendation. and overlay it on the existing plan. And what I found is that there was a lot of alignment. you know, these are people who have done their own research and they've gotten familiar with it. But I will say that, are they, is that group of people being challenged by anyone else in the business? Maybe yes, maybe no, because there's still this... Khullani Abdullahi (40:52.759) Great. Gianne James (41:14.612) Like you said, the AI literacy piece, it's not evenly distributed across the organization yet. right, right. So it's, what I think I've shown by providing this recommendation is that I've done the research. I know, I understand the frameworks that Khullani Abdullahi (41:17.421) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (41:23.895) And that's true at every organization right now. Yeah. Gianne James (41:43.499) that are out there that are being promoted and that are going to be considered best practices, regardless of if it's formal regulation or not. I think at the end of the day, everyone is seeking a international set of AI standards and we're slowly getting there. if you're paying attention to what's coming out of the EU. Khullani Abdullahi (42:11.447) Right. Right. Gianne James (42:12.182) China just came out with their global standards and recommendations for that. again, it's like, kind of go back to this, like the IT function is concerned with getting the AI out the door. And yes, it's important that they understand what's going on in the regulations, but it could literally be one person's job to stay up to date on what is going on in AI regulations, standards, frameworks, so on and so forth. I just, and then dispensing that, it's not even just keeping up to date, it's dispensing that information throughout the organization that creates and maintains that AI literacy, right? Like it's, AI literacy is not a Khullani Abdullahi (42:45.303) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (42:53.366) Right. Gianne James (43:10.908) one and done, it's going to continue to evolve as more and more companies build systems, models, and tools, and resources. So you almost have to keep that brain elasticity going when it comes to AI, because it's not stagnant. And it's not slowing down either. Like I think, you know, the vertical, you know, lines of AI or like the ability of these GPT models, the expanding capabilities of what they can do and ingest and process in real time is ever increasing. to think that Khullani Abdullahi (43:41.527) Right. Gianne James (44:07.402) what we know today is going to be the same as what we know in two weeks even. It's just not realistic. Right, right, yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (44:13.045) Right. The GPT-5 dropped two days ago. Right? And that's three to four months after we just got the new 03 Pro model, right? So I think to your point about things moving really fast, I do want to highlight one thing that I think is clear from this conversation, which is this is an assumption I'm making. Gianne James (44:26.06) right. Khullani Abdullahi (44:40.403) ability to make these set of recommendations and to serve as this internal subject matter expert, bridging these fields in your current role is a function of you proactively doing like two additional degrees in the last seven, eight years and the certification. So very proactive continuing education. Do you feel like you would have been able to provide these recommendations, do this research, correlate and synthesize without those active, proactive continuing education efforts, whether it was a degree or a certification? Gianne James (45:21.612) No, I don't. For myself personally, I found that the... Khullani Abdullahi (45:26.336) Mm-hmm. Gianne James (45:33.196) the structured learning environment works best for me. That may not be the same for everyone. Khullani Abdullahi (45:39.436) Yeah. So you need the semester, the tuition, the deadlines, exam week. You don't want to just go on YouTube. You need the grade. You need the A, the degree. And I ask that because I think a lot of companies want employees like you. And they want to enable employees who do want to do structured learning. Gianne James (45:47.7) the great at the end. Khullani Abdullahi (46:05.983) So how is it, what is the enablement education culture benefits at first, right? Like what are they doing that made this possible? Because I don't think that's true at every organization. And so I think let's give first and win trust by extension their credits for you to rise through the ranks and then to continue your own upskilling while providing value to the organization. Like how is that possible? Gianne James (46:18.924) Yeah. Yes. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (46:35.627) What made that possible? What's the cultural expectations happening? Especially because I'm sure you want to attract more AI compliance experts to your organization. So think of this as an opportunity of why maybe both on the technical and business side, people might want to join your organization. Gianne James (46:55.724) Yeah, so I've had very supportive managers, mentors, sponsors throughout my career. you get out what you put in, right? I've been here for 18 years. Some things that you may hear. Khullani Abdullahi (47:14.955) Mm-hmm. Gianne James (47:23.084) about me from other people is like my work ethic is unmatched and just different things like that. This is not bragging. It's just I've put in a lot into the organization and I believe that they are rewarding me by allowing me and investing in me and allowing me to pursue these things. Some things I've pursued on my own. Khullani Abdullahi (47:31.307) Yes, yeah, it's the reality. Gianne James (47:50.881) but I still have needed time to help balance school life, work life, home life. Gianne James (48:25.693) for Pete's sake. Do you hear me now? Gianne James (48:34.134) but they've still needed to allow for me to maintain that home, school, and work life intersectionality, not truly balance at times. Khullani Abdullahi (48:44.403) Mm-hmm, because it's not a balance. Gianne James (48:49.334) So I am appreciative of them allowing me to advance in a way that hopefully I'll have the opportunity to benefit them by helping them along on this AI journey. So my role today is not solely focused on that. I've just been providing some feedback and opinions based on my research and the work that I've done outside of work hours. But I think we're getting there to a place where this will be something that I can say I'm contributing to full time, at least fingers crossed that's my goal. Khullani Abdullahi (49:31.277) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (49:39.223) Right? I love that. I love that. Let me ask, how does AI show up in your personal life? How does it show up in your parenting life at all? How does it show up with the employees that you manage? How do you use it at work? Independently of kind of the AI products you guys are building as an organization to serve your customers. and their customers by extension. What is AI use for a senior vice president in premium finance look like? Gianne James (50:15.862) So we actually do not, as of today, we do not have access to chat GPT or any AI search functionality offered by a browser or anything like that. And no co-pilot, no co-pilot yet. Khullani Abdullahi (50:19.575) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (50:26.401) Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (50:30.318) Okay. Do you use copilot? No copilot. Are you guys a 365 company? Okay. But copilot's turned off. Okay. Gianne James (50:37.098) We do, yes. Correct. So, work, obviously, it's very restrictive. And so it's basically, I don't use it at work. In my personal life, and actually, let me pivot to school. School is also no AI, chat, GPT. Khullani Abdullahi (50:51.765) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (50:55.628) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (51:02.721) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (51:06.221) So Kellogg MBA program, you will fail a class that is no, so zero tolerance policy for AI usage in any of your work. Gianne James (51:10.396) so far? Yes. Gianne James (51:17.299) unless it is specifically, you are specifically instructed by your professor to use it in a specific manner. So academia has it, yes, I actually had an assignment last night where they, but they built a specific AI model for the course. And so I interacted with the chat GPT, you know. Khullani Abdullahi (51:22.113) that professor to do so. Khullani Abdullahi (51:28.193) Has that happened? There are professors? Okay. Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (51:40.394) Okay, Gianne James (51:46.623) specific to the course. Yeah. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (51:48.383) Okay, interesting. So you are prohibited from using it in two big buckets of your life. Your current MBA program at Kellogg, at Northwestern University, and in the work environment, right? So for the purposes of drafting content, generating, so you still have to read your own PDFs? Okay, Sean, Sean. Gianne James (51:56.906) Yes. Yes. Gianne James (52:04.576) Right. Gianne James (52:12.394) Yes. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (52:14.734) You don't have a tool to summarize those PowerPoints your colleagues send. I'm so proud of your organization. You have to read your colleagues' 45 page PowerPoints they send the night before the meeting. Go ahead first. Because I can tell you there are several organizations that I know about where we're seeing shadow AI use, where people are like, summarize. Gianne James (52:20.683) No. Gianne James (52:34.572) Thanks. Gianne James (52:40.511) Cheers! Khullani Abdullahi (52:42.514) Cheryl's 200 page PowerPoint that I'm not gonna read right okay so that's not happening there I love it Gianne James (52:43.604) Yeah! Yeah, yeah, right, right. You know, I can see that. I can definitely see that. mean, it's, I think I am, I am naturally risk averse, so it makes sense that I'm a risk management professional. Yes, so it's, you know. Khullani Abdullahi (53:01.897) I'm good. Your temperament and your career, they lined up. Gianne James (53:14.412) In my personal life, I am very, very careful about the type of prompts and the type of information. I strip it of anything that's identifiable. I interact very, very high level with chat GPT. It does not, I did ask it. said, who am I? And it said, I don't, don't have enough information. Khullani Abdullahi (53:22.581) Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (53:27.412) Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (53:32.233) Okay, so it doesn't know your name. Khullani Abdullahi (53:38.561) Wow, I don't know. So you don't have the memory feature saved. Gianne James (53:46.189) No, I guess not. Khullani Abdullahi (53:47.945) No? When I tell you that mine can tell you the day I resigned from my last job and started this company, when I tell you it walked me through my whole life story and was I've uploaded my 20 year old astrology charts, my transcripts, my resumes, my diary entries. I to your point. and risk averse in some areas, but when it comes to privacy, my disposition has been, it is all out there. It is all accessible. It's on the dark web. Everything has been cataloged. I'm Somali, Ethiopian, Muslim American. I'm sure I got 18 files at the DOD. Gianne James (54:26.516) Okay. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (54:39.649) Grub in Minnesota, like it's just out there. And so this has been my mantra. My mantra has been, I am willing to stand by and own the things that I think, the things that I say, and the things that I do. Gianne James (54:42.87) Yeah. Gianne James (54:59.244) Great. Khullani Abdullahi (54:59.573) and I will deal with the consequences of any of that becoming public. So, Chachi VT will be like, you're coming up on your one year anniversary of resignation and starting this company, how's it going? Right? Like that is, I'm at the other end of that spectrum. Yours doesn't know your name. Mine is prompting me for my anniversary feelings and taking the sleep. no, I love that because I think it's, it's Gianne James (55:13.116) Yeah, yeah. Gianne James (55:22.048) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (55:24.701) Even in AI governance and risk, you have this posture of risk compliance in your personal life. Tell me more about how it shows up in parenting or household management. Where else are you finding it helpful or useful? Gianne James (55:30.815) Yes. Gianne James (55:41.229) Um, so I find it, so I have a five year old. He has not yet encountered chat GPT or anything like it yet. Um, having conversations with my high schooler who is going into his senior year, um, about why you should cautiously use, you know, chadgpt and it should not be a replacement for thinking or homework or you know, like it's You know, like some people are saying your brain is not going to be as nimble if you're relying on Chadgpt or whatever to tell you versus you telling it And then how do you also flex those muscles to question? Khullani Abdullahi (56:14.005) Yes. Yes. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (56:25.153) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (56:32.609) Right. Gianne James (56:37.012) what's coming out of it. So. Khullani Abdullahi (56:38.689) Yeah. Gianne James (56:42.2) That, I probably don't know how often he actually uses it because I've had those types of conversations. So he's probably, don't want to hear what this lady's talking about. But one way. Khullani Abdullahi (56:51.795) Yes, yes. I have reached out to the Open AI team. I just sent a random note saying, you know, we need like parental. accounts for the child CHP too. Like I would like to be able to provision a family account. Like it exists for Apple, it exists for Google, exists for Discord. And I would like to know usage. I would like to know prompts. I would like to know access levels. I would like to be able to restrict certain things, right? there, and that I think is they're building for, think enterprise and business where I think, you know, there's a lot of money there. So it makes sense. But the parenting side, I think is just hyper, is very also Gianne James (57:05.192) Right. Right. Gianne James (57:11.122) Exactly. Gianne James (57:16.084) Yep. Right. Gianne James (57:23.275) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (57:33.729) very vital and critical because all of our children of a certain age are using it with or without our knowledge. And if their parents are not AI literate, they're using it in ways their parents have no idea about, right? Like you could go track his account and log in and threaten him to get the password. Like that could happen. But if you didn't know he had it or what it did, how would you even begin to have that conversation? Gianne James (57:46.208) Exactly. Gianne James (57:52.456) Yeah, right. Exactly. Exactly, exactly. yeah, it's in that kind of takes me back to a case that I featured in my thesis. It's the character AI Google case where the young man committed suicide thinking that he was going to be, you know, move on to the other side where this AI character lived. Khullani Abdullahi (58:09.261) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (58:12.781) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (58:26.433) Yeah, heartbreaking. Gianne James (58:28.044) And it is a truly, truly heartbreaking case. from my parents perspective, seeing your child just wrapped up by a fictional, non-existent character and then to have a company throw their hands up and say, well, it's not my fault. It's not our fault, but you designed it to do this. Khullani Abdullahi (59:01.791) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (59:06.924) way. Gianne James (59:07.628) you were made aware that it had this tendency and could impact people in a very negative way and you still move forward in the name of money. So that's where, you know, we're talking about the, not we, but you you hear at the federal level deregulation of AI for, innovate for the purposes of innovation, but at the cost of what? What in this process or what in this mindset of, you know, let's just push ahead regardless of the implications to consumers and we're just going to see how it shakes out like that. That's not very responsible in my opinion. And so when you're When you have responsible AI, that's not the approach you're going to take. You're going to be very intentional about understanding the social, technical implications of what you're building. And you're going to put the proper safeguards. You're going to give parents access. You're going to put up as many warning labels as you can. be part of conversations around building content on awareness of, you know, when someone's getting a, becoming addicted, you know, to an AI tool. Like, and those are the types of things that we have yet to see. Like we don't have enough examples, but people need to be braced for it and need to be aware of it. Khullani Abdullahi (01:00:56.33) Right. Gianne James (01:01:05.12) it's, it's, I, I, I shudder to think about the companies that are going to take that federal deregulation stance approach and run with it and say, we'll just deal with the consequences later. Khullani Abdullahi (01:01:05.259) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (01:01:27.788) Yes. Gianne James (01:01:29.437) There are countless numbers of compliance failures that we can look back on. Wells Fargo, yeah, every, I'm reading a case about AIG. It's like these failures happen when we take, Khullani Abdullahi (01:01:42.004) Lehman Brothers. Khullani Abdullahi (01:01:51.593) Mm-hmm. catastrophic. Gianne James (01:01:57.152) when we take the training wheels, when you allow people to go fast and furious, this is what happens because the risk managers are not brought into the room. It's the revenue generators that are brought into the room. so balancing who's making the money versus who's trying to protect the money, you know, is a very serious... Khullani Abdullahi (01:01:59.499) Yep. Khullani Abdullahi (01:02:11.627) Yes. Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (01:02:21.099) Yes. Gianne James (01:02:26.816) conversation to have. now is the time to start having those conversations regardless of what's coming out of the White House. Khullani Abdullahi (01:02:35.725) I think that's such an important point because Europe gets made fun of a lot in the US, right? So we talk about Europe's hyper regulatory environment. Gianne James (01:02:42.411) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:02:48.961) We talk about their slower GDP growth. We talk about the fact that they don't have as many successful unicorns. Their market capitalization of their companies isn't as high. They don't generate as much innovation, et cetera, et cetera. And so Europe is often contrasted with the US, where we have the most unicorns, the greatest amount of zero to one net new innovation, the greatest market. Gianne James (01:02:52.864) Yeah. Gianne James (01:03:04.459) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:03:17.579) right, stock market, capitalization in the world, all of these things. But what's interesting in, I think AI deregulation is the first time that we're trying to preempt regulation of an existential technology, because we haven't regulated it yet. Gianne James (01:03:18.923) Yep. Gianne James (01:03:40.008) Yeah. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:03:40.649) So we're affirmative, we're preempting regulation and we've taken the position, I think a significant part of civil society and the political and tech infrastructure and groups have said innovation must be prioritized even if it means we don't think about the environmental impact. Gianne James (01:03:45.26) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:04:09.642) of the data centers. We don't think about the labor impact of all of these people who are going to be replaced in the next five years. We don't think about the need to upskill or enable, even if we don't even think about the risks or liabilities. So I don't know if you've ever heard, but there was something called the Monsanto Rider, which was this little piece of legislation added to a bill, maybe about a Gianne James (01:04:17.558) Right. Gianne James (01:04:29.876) Okay, yes. Khullani Abdullahi (01:04:35.853) 10, 15 years ago, if I'm remembering correctly. And it exempted Monsanto from having liability for the cancer causing abilities of Roundup, the pesticide that was widely used at the time. This is before Roundup was sold to, think, Bayer or some pharma company. And so that was an attempt to preempt Gianne James (01:04:50.792) Mm-hmm. Yes. Right. Khullani Abdullahi (01:05:03.583) liability, right? And because that kind of liability would have bankrupted that business unit, of Monsanto. And it feels to me like the AI companies are on a similar trajectory. Like the frontier AI companies are like, people may die. Grids may collapse. Like my Chai GBT-5 in the wrong hands may enable someone to hack Gianne James (01:05:04.694) rank. Gianne James (01:05:08.693) Yes. Gianne James (01:05:23.359) Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (01:05:33.111) Cook County where we live, in Illinois. It may take Illinois's energy grid offline. What are the consequences of a civil suit and all the people who going to die when there is no power in Illinois for seven days because the electricity grid got hacked? Gianne James (01:05:34.73) Right, right. Gianne James (01:05:39.328) brain. Gianne James (01:05:49.631) Exactly. Khullani Abdullahi (01:05:49.931) because somebody was enabled by an LLM tool and turned it into an offensive cybersecurity weapon. And so, and we're preemptively saying, yes, that's a potential use case and outcome of this technology I'm building and putting into the hands of people, very few safeguards and guard rails. And by the way, it would be ridiculous to hold me accountable because then I would go bankrupt and we wouldn't have this innovation or this amazing company. So we have to, we're, it's, Gianne James (01:05:52.5) Exactly. Gianne James (01:06:15.808) Right. Right. Khullani Abdullahi (01:06:20.202) We have to take a position, I think, as society, as executives, as parents, as companies, and say, are we OK with that? Are we OK with the worst case scenario happening and telling companies you will not be held responsible and that therefore will shape what they build and how they deploy it? Gianne James (01:06:28.812) Right. Khullani Abdullahi (01:06:42.957) Because if I'm not going to be held responsible for the compliance failures or the risk mitigation, why would I spend money, time and energy slowing down my time to market? To me, the standard that has no consequences. What did Charlie Munger always say? Show me the incentives. I will show you the outcome. If there is no incentive that negatively punishes company by reputation, and it's really their pocketbook. Gianne James (01:06:49.334) Right. Gianne James (01:06:54.632) yes. yeah. exactly. Gianne James (01:07:01.748) Yeah, exactly. Gianne James (01:07:06.848) Right. Right. Mm-hmm. Khullani Abdullahi (01:07:12.501) If there are no fines, fees or lawsuits, there will be no corrective preemptive compliance action coming out. Gianne James (01:07:20.237) And to be honest, the size of these organizations, even if there was a fine or a penalty, it's pocket change. It's the cost of doing business. Exactly. Exactly. So it, as you mentioned, it's just the, the incentives are not. Khullani Abdullahi (01:07:28.098) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:07:32.779) Right. Is it just the cost of doing business? How high would it have to be? Right. Gianne James (01:07:49.58) are not there yet. We'll see what happens in four years. Khullani Abdullahi (01:07:53.023) yet. Yes. mean, look, I feel really good about being in Illinois, right? Which is why I have this podcast focused on Illinois, because I think we have a great governor. We have our we have really innovative civil society and tech leaders. think there's a lot of ethics and integrity and responsibility in Illinois, even though we end up on the news for a lot of shenanigans. I think I yeah, but I think the people who are here. Gianne James (01:08:02.549) Yeah. Gianne James (01:08:21.609) other things, yes. Khullani Abdullahi (01:08:26.24) A lot of the, I would say the vast majority of the leaders here are high integrity, high trust leaders in politics, civil society, in the tech, in the financial industries, et cetera. And it's allowed us to build, I think a resilient state when it comes to the market here. Having said that, tell me what you are projecting for... Gianne James (01:08:43.443) Yes. Khullani Abdullahi (01:08:51.997) AI in Illinois, AI at your organization. If you and I have this conversation in two years, right? August 2027, provided that we're all still here, that the democracy is still standing, the democratic republic is still alive. No GPT-8 came out that was like, you humans are doing too much. The matrix, I'm going to implement the matrix because if you guys are awake, you're destroying earth, right? Like provided that that is not the case and you and I can sit in our respective homes to have a conversation. What do you, what are you, what do you expect to see? Like what are, what are your predictions, projections? And you know, I may never get to ask you again in two years, so you don't have to worry about being right. Just want to pick your brain about. Gianne James (01:09:21.964) Exactly. Gianne James (01:09:28.116) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:09:43.233) What are you expecting to be different in the world of work, life, at your company, in finance in general? What does it look like in 2027? Gianne James (01:09:53.699) that's a good question. I think... I think we'll be more comfortable, like from the business perspective, I think we'll be more comfortable with how we're going to implement and use AI. Like we're just starting, right? Like, so two years is right about when you start really figuring it out. And so with that, yes. Khullani Abdullahi (01:10:18.337) Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:10:22.286) Can I ask one question there? Do you think that that traditional enterprise timeline will continue in the age of AI? Gianne James (01:10:38.548) I, you know, it depends on how it's implemented. It depends on how much data we're keeping and tracking and actually leveraging on performance metrics. And so yeah, I think more mature organizations, they'll get smart about it and shorten it. But the ones that are still kind of Khullani Abdullahi (01:10:50.623) Okay. Okay. Khullani Abdullahi (01:10:59.157) Yeah. Right. Gianne James (01:11:06.508) bloundering and trying to figure out their, hell, their data governance structures. It's going to take them longer. Khullani Abdullahi (01:11:14.605) Thank Khullani Abdullahi (01:11:19.277) I shouldn't laugh because there are people, I mean like 30 % of companies have a data governance committee. Let's be real, yeah. 25%. Okay, so you think that in two years, at least at work, you'll be coming to a place where you'll have sufficient data to reflect on the AI maturity. Do you think that you will have finished the proof of concept stage? Gianne James (01:11:26.258) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Khullani Abdullahi (01:11:48.405) and be moving into scaling, what does that look like? Gianne James (01:11:52.446) Yes, I would agree with that. Definitely scaling across the organization. I think in two years, you will have at least implemented your top five use cases, just for round numbers. And so at the end of that year too, you will have gathered some initial data. but it's probably still not optimized, right? Because you're still, the people, the boots on the ground are still getting used to it. They're still trying to understand the best way to employ it. So I think you'll kind of get a glimpse into. Khullani Abdullahi (01:12:33.729) right? Gianne James (01:12:42.32) how the company, how the users, that's a better term, how the users of the AI solutions are adapting and be able to adjust your deployment timelines and strategies based off of that. Khullani Abdullahi (01:12:58.573) Right, and accordingly. So thank you for sharing that. I have a round robin, fire rapid set of questions to end every podcast. Illinois and Chicago in particular really brag about their food scene. So I'd love to know your favorite restaurant, a favorite place to grab drinks, favorite summertime activity, and then your final thoughts on. AI and you can take that in any direction you want. Gianne James (01:13:29.165) Okay. So favorite, I mean, Chicago is just a food town. There's always a nice new spot to try. One of the newest places I've tried and enjoyed was Ghost Donkey down in the loop. So shout out to them for a memorable experience, all the tequila and every type you can have. Khullani Abdullahi (01:13:40.383) Right. Right. Khullani Abdullahi (01:13:46.381) Okay? I like that. Khullani Abdullahi (01:13:52.873) Okay, I'm gonna add that to the list. They serve tequila there? Okay, that's going up on the list. So your restaurant and drink place are combined. Okay. Gianne James (01:13:58.443) Yes. Gianne James (01:14:04.585) Hahaha Gianne James (01:14:08.812) and final thoughts on AI. so I, you know, I would kind of loop back to what we started off with at the beginning. Like if you are interested in AI as a non tech background, a professional, lean in and do it, even if it scares you, even if it seems foreign. as you mentioned, like. Everyone is new in this space. There's nobody with 30 years of AI experience at the intersection of whatever specialty you bring. So lean into this new era. It's not a trend. This is a new era. It's here to stay. So lean in, learn all that you can. Don't be afraid of it. build your community, look for people who are talking about AI on LinkedIn, podcasts like this one, like there's an abundance of resources you just have to find. Khullani Abdullahi (01:15:24.191) Excellent. John James, thank you so much for taking the time to share this, your journey, your thoughts, your experiences. And to my listeners, thanks for taking the time. Always appreciate you guys finding the episodes on Spotify. And August is a big month. We're coming to you in August. So I have a ton of more guests. And until next time, thank you guys so much.