Inside a lot of us there is a thrill seeker who would admit to longing for long stretches of freeway, long forgotten by the highway patrol, not another car. Nothing, for as far as sight can see. The road’s emptiness meets the distant horizon, a road for one. Seizing the opportunity, laying into the pedal, until it meets the floorboard, the driver accelerates to careless abandon. 120 mph, knuckles turning white as they grip the steering wheel. In the thrill of the moment, throwing aside any worry of the one millisecond of miscalculation that can conclude in a calamity of flying parts, and debris. Oblivious to the potentiality of tragic outcomes. The driver’s experience is transcendent: pure ecstasy, speeding toward oblivion.
Absurd as this may sound, I would like to present this juxtaposition, and place you as the operator of another ride. Instead I would like for you to imagine yourself traveling at the same speed as our other driver. Weaving in and out of traffic, but this is without the same hit of adrenaline and briefly lived sense of immortality. In its place is an urgency to survive. An exhaustion of feeling like you are trying to keep up with the other drivers, only to look down and realize you are the one running at 120 mph on a tire with an owner’s manual in hand. Unbalanced and unsure, yet in a hot pursuit chasing down the auto parts that elude you down the freeway. Knowing that you need them, despite not knowing what they are for, or how to assemble them once you catch up.
This is the reality of AI for most small business owners.
Deep inside this race, the need to remain competitive in this rapidly changing landscape creates what I refer to as an existential FOMO, which to some degree, we can agree is irrational, but not completely without merit. The owner also knows they need the car to stay in the race and need the right parts to assemble it, whatever those parts may be.
Because the harsh reality is this. An owner that doesn’t assemble their AI vehicle to drive their business into the near future, will be making a fatal miscalculation.
Don’t believe me. F.A.F.O.
