Adventurous CMO

E08 - Nate & Greg Explore: Authenticity in an Artificial World

• Nate Spees & Greg Gibson • Season 1 • Episode 8

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This week, our hosts Nate and Greg get real about what authenticity means in a world where AI is shaking up how we create and connect.

They dive into the chaos and opportunity of AI-powered marketing but remind us all that behind every tool, there’s a human beating heart driving courage, creativity, and connection.

Nate and Greg break down why agencies aren’t just about problem-solving anymore, they’re the champions of bravery and transformation. They talk speed vs. craft, the thrill (and the risk) of making fast content and why true creative magic comes from human grit and empathy, not just algorithms.

If you’re wondering how to embrace AI without losing the soul of your work or how to keep pushing boundaries when the rules keep changing, this episode is your roadmap.

Tune in for real talk on staying adventurous, authentic and unapologetically human in the face of change.

Sponsored by Grizzly, Adventurous CMO is hosted by Nate Spees and Greg Gibson.

Grizzly is an independent creative agency. We guide brands onward™ to challenge convention and impact culture.

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Nate:

Things that are on our mind as well as happening in the industry and really exploring how we navigate each of these different topics. And this will be the first of many. But beyond that, also just thinking of seeing, talking about what's out there and what people are saying, and really reflecting it back to who we are and how we think about it. Nate: So excited for today, Greg? Yeah, for sure. What's going on in your world? I'm wearing a brave hat in honor of your son. And they're they're they're big win yesterday. Just rocking it Braves the actual Braves team isn't that great right now, so I wish they were, but but your son's team's much better. Nate: So there we go. Greg: Oh, Tons of updates this last week at Google io and all of the things happening with Flow. I feel like my feed is 90% AI video now, and I don't know about you, but it's crazy. And then just like literally within the last hour perplexity launched labs which is their kind of multimodal tool for creating. Greg: And I just, I, I thought this week we could talk about. Authenticity, which is a subject that's come up a ton in the last several conversations we've had with guests and authentically, how do we remain ourselves as these things happen with AI entering our work? And just maybe pose the first question

Greg:

And and I think it's really fascinating because we are able, the speed at which we're able to. Learn and get information and and have that information actually inform strategic decision making. Making not even just be data, but truly actually be like concise strategic recommendations, et cetera. Nate: And in actual creative output it's crazy how much everything is changing. But it's interesting because we talked about it a little bit on I think when we did our AI conversation a few episodes ago. But I always come back to the theory of what's the simplest

Nate:

'cause we are being, like our role in it is DEF is providing a service. And so to me, the thing that is the most interesting about all the transformation taking place is you. The human element of being in the corner, in someone's corner and helping them solve a problem and enabling confidence and doing a lot of soft skill related things that are all absolutely predicated on domain expertise and like creative expertise, et cetera. Nate: But that I. Value add of being someone's confidant and someone that is champion like The execution to really being a partner that is championing and bolstering the effort of a great visionary leader. And so to me, the interesting thing that, trickles out of that is the reality is the tactics I. What we implement, how we implement it, the tools that we use, the, like speed at which we do it, the vehicle in which we do it. Nate: All of those things are changing. Like those are all things that will change. However, if I bring it to its most simplest form, I think that human beings are inher in inherently want to be connected to other human beings. And like we've talked about this in our business, like we as an agency have been at our best, when we relationally are at our best with each other and with the team. Nate: Like when we are driven by, with And to me again, I know that's super esoteric answer, but that's how I'm looking at it right now. And it doesn't mean all that stuff, like, all the specifics of the nuance of how the, how the sausage is made is not super important, but at a high level that's how I'm looking at it. Nate: What about you? Greg: Yeah. Really interesting. And I know we touched on that a little bit with, I can't remember which guest recently, but I definitely agree. I think. There is something that I'm seeing, like I, a lot of the creative directors, creative leaders that I am connected to, a lot of people are talking about the feeling of making. Greg: And I think that there's something really interesting happening right now. Whether you're you work in our business or I, I even hear my neighbor talking about like their first experiences with chat, And they're like, I spent the whole weekend and I made 120 pieces of content and it's crazy. And and then, it's mostly unwatchable. I. The various sides of that coin, all these people are talking about the experience of making and what it means to them. And I think people who previously couldn't make, or they didn't have the skills or tools to make, are talking about the idea of getting the i the experience of getting the idea, their ideas outta their head and somewhere that they can share and what that makes them feel. Greg: And people who. Has spent a, y years, decades making and are now seeing the experience of that change or talking about a lot of people are talking about the loss of joy and how if we remove the experience of making the

Greg:

If we have a great idea and part of the joy is in the bringing that idea to life. What is our role in it? Are we just are we prompters, are we directors? Are we overseers of something else making? And I think most people that I'm seeing talk about this on our side of the business are saying that I. Greg: Inherently there is something unique to the doing. To the making. That totally can only be made by us. So I don't know. I don't know if you've seen the, you're seeing these conversations. Nate: Yeah. I think that if I could respond to that the interesting thing about like it doing it in a marketing organization or in a creative organization or the combination of both is, speed to getting it done. It does not inherently But to an artisan that is a marble sculpture crafter. They like that is a totally different experience. And it is both making, they both make something, but to one. Every chip and every piece of sandpaper and everything that you've done has built something that has been totally human made and like with pure intention. Nate: And the other is made and probably better, if you like, without human error, but lacks the like depth of what did it take to actually make it So I hear what you're saying. I think that's the tension that exists that doesn't have there. I wish there was like a pinpoint like. Here's the answer to it. Nate: But it is very much using that analogy. That's happening all the

Nate:

So you're like, wow, that was nuts with a client, with clients and internally and all that. But it I just think that the reward is people always talk about the, you gotta love the journey. I think the, that's the interesting side of all this is like, how do we not make. Nate: Creative work and frankly, any work just become transaction because one, the enablement of more people making, I'm actually all for it. I think that's fantastic. More ideas are getting out there and more people are trying to explore ways to tell stories and build products and do all these things. Nate: That's a good thing, but the tension will remain in. How do we know if we've gotten far enough? How do we know if, like the tension For sure. I think I saw someone a comment recently about there will always be people and there will always be a resistance to the hard stuff. And I think the ability to create with AI amplifies both sides of that, right? Yeah. There are gonna be people who dive in and either leverage AI or don't leverage AI to do the hard. Greg: Things, which are usually the human things, and they're gonna people be people who say, you know what? I want this to be as easy as possible and right. The first idea that I think of is gonna get made by ai and it's gonna go out there, I'm gonna blast it out It's interesting the dichotomy between like transaction and transactional content that's spilling, everyone's feed and like real storytelling. Yeah, and real, real meaning. I have a feeling that these tools that we're talking about are like weeks old. Months away from now we're gonna find people using them to do like real meaningful work. Greg: But right now it's it's, the rattlesnake shedding its skin. And every single person getting every idea that they've had pent up in their in their brain and like the, just doing for doing sake. I wonder, when when you're talking to either our clients or other leaders like. Greg: How would you guide people to, to navigate the journey? Like where should people start in terms of finding their authentic path in this like crazy

Greg:

And go out and start to understand how how AI is transforming their life and how it will continue to transform not only the workplace, but just the world around us and how we interact with it. But that doesn't mean that you have to surrender the vi like your, I think this is where it's really interesting 'cause what technology changes and we've never really seen it in our lifetime. Nate: At this clip, but it's really easy to feel like it's an A or a B type situation, right? It becomes this thing where it's Dan and Chip Heath wrote a book about decision making years and years ago, and it's all about how like most people, when left to the like moment of decision making, make every Find ways to leverage tools and technology to be an enabler of your ability to prioritize the things you're the best at. And to help make more of that and start there. Don't try to like re usurp yourself from the equation. And go, no one can do what I do. I think that obviously computers are smarter than me. Nate: So like I'm no longer a storyteller. I'll let that I'll, give that away to somebody else. I would rather say Hey, what is it that you love doing? And how can these tools help you do that? I think is how I look at that. And I think that. Is coupled with something that I saw our friend Paul Drohan post on social, I think this week about the whole AI killing your, like AI taking your job things. Nate: And

Nate:

It's the decline of genuine human connection, meaningful engagement, and undervaluing of soft skills like empathy, communication, and appreciation. 'cause when workplaces lack trust and collaboration and recognition, people disengage. And leave, not because of ai, but because they don't feel seen or valued and the future. Nate: Work belongs to those who invest in relationship and foster real engagement, show appreciation for others. Like I thought that was so profoundly said. Because I think that's where we live. That's where we're at. It's like the moment of going. Put effort into learning and in exploring and doing all that, while simultaneously recognizing that if you throw out all the human side of this in the process, you're gonna be screwed, like on the back end of all this. Nate: Yeah, you'll for sure. And these are new skills. And you have to learn to do it poorly before you learn. To do it at a high level and get to unearthing. The good stuff. I I loved Greg Hahn had a note around this recently, and he called it Darwinism, but with a, an a and an I capitalized. This idea that AI videos featuring characters, talking about AI characters being AI characters is like this, like new inception that we. Greg: We've seen across every place that content lives. But we are like he he calls it the sur, the era of the survival of the freshest. Which would be a badass poster. We'll have to design And it'll push us to be more relevant, more insightful, more interesting. And the fact that like our survival as creators depends on it. And I go back to. What we chatted about with Casey, which is I think he was like, I just effing loved big ideas and that's how I, how our brand stays like relevant and authentic. Greg: There is this translation from like at our individual level to to brands like the, this idea that like the, the world is getting inundated with things that are absolutely not authentic. What have you seen brands. Surviving or like navigating this tide? In in a way that they're owning their authenticity as a way to stand out from an even busier and noisier space. Nate: I was gonna flip that question And I'd love to parlay that into a question after that around why creativity is a critical leadership function in authenticity. Because I do think that's something that we're, wrestling through now as we explore for sure this topic. Greg: Yeah. The aura ring work that came out this week is fantastic. Greg: Give us the finger, I think is the line. Just brilliant work from Nice and Frank. I think, very rooted in. A human point of view, a human insight, which is like getting old is badass. And how do you leverage data in right, in order to grow old with grace And and I think kudos to a brand for having, having a great brief. And as well as as well as like the confidence and courage to stand behind an idea like that. So simple, I think. Maybe flipping it to like the, a more meta side of that. Like I do think that Google has done a great job managing the both sides of being able to give people tools that like honestly are just filling the world with slot, but also their own way that they're navigating the AI tools that they're putting into the world is very human. Greg: Like partnering with real filmmakers to, to make to make art, to explore the tools to show what's possible. Partnering with musicians to, I, I think at at IO they had Toro, which was a little we might have jumped the shark, but also ama amazing that he is, like he's up there live, mixing stuff on stage with an ai like creating alongside of him. Greg: I think that Google's really

Greg:

Like he grew song from 12 billion to 19 billion over a very short period of time when everyone said, what is a creative doing in a CEO role? And at the same time, open AI is by, basically spending six and a half billion dollars on. Johnny, his brain and saying that that viewpoint matters, like the experiences that we all, we all are gonna inhabit for the next many years should be shaped by someone with a, like a really sharp point of view. Greg: So I think to your point, like the people behind the work matter

Nate:

The second is to. Say I'm intrigued, but stand on the sideline. Still critical of all the people that are putting the effort in. And then and then you've got the early adopters that are like, I'm all in on this. I'm gonna figure out every nuance of how to make it work. But I actually think a lot of people could find a fourth area. Nate: It's in between that, where I think you can hold the tension of look. It's emotional for massive change to happen in any industry, let alone all industries at the same time. And of course, every industry's gonna, it's gonna happen at a different pace and a different rate. And we talked on our AI episode about how if all ads

Greg:

Like how do you actually like brand differentiation and actually standing for something and have a point of view? Becomes like ridiculously important, like more important than ever because all of a sudden everything's gonna feel and look and act and be the same. And I saw something interesting 'cause we we have a subset of business in the hospitality space and I was looking at looking at something that said, and I haven't fact checked it so I could be wrong, but the proper hotels was like pulling this is very brand and very like, human-centric. Nate: They realized that their core audience. Is very health conscious and very like wellness driven. So they're pulling all seed oils out of. Like their entire, like all their hotels would be seed oil free. Now that's a bold, super bold move, but it's also really interesting 'cause it's a very human move because it's like we know our audience, we know who we're for, we know what we're about, so we're gonna serve them and serve them well at the level that we believe is necessary to be Yeah. I think you, you hit on something that we've talked to the team about recently, which is if you look at creating or the continuum of putting things into the world as an hourglass, you have. The top of the hourglass is inputs, and those inputs are increasingly gonna be ai generated or compiled or analyzed, and we're going to be able to get through that funnel faster to the human part, which is that bottleneck in the middle. Greg: But it's really not a bottleneck. It's like a, it's like the great the great, simplifier the great authenticity machine that enables us to make what goes in more And I think those outputs are helping us get somewhere faster, but need. They need that human input in order to stay authentic. And I think I saw someone talking about the rise of kind of remix culture where great ideas once we're re re-engineered by creators and we're now having the rise of, AI video can make those ideas. Greg: The next remix of themselves. Like where you can see a fake AI creator, basically like repurposing, a Virgil, a Ablo quote, and you can, if you didn't know better, you would think that this is a, this is someone's original idea. And I think we're in an age where AI will be so good at

Nate:

Absolutely. I was gonna try to mic drop your last comment, but then I realized if I dropped my podcast, Mike, how would I respond? So I didn't do it, but I think you're totally right. These are the questions and things that I think all marketers and Oh, and here's the tension, right? Nate: Here's the greatest tension of all this for marketers. You're having to navigate all of this while simultaneously hitting the, hitting your goals running campaigns, doing all the other activities There's this reality that like, we have no clue what's around the curvature of the earth. We don't know where we're gonna end up. But you still have to be willing and comfortable enough to lean in and keep going and willing to recognize that you're gonna have to be decisive and deliberate regardless of if you can, I think, I love what Kevin said about make as many asynchronous bets as you can. Nate: I think that's absolutely true. While simultaneously there be plenty of bets that you may not know what's gonna happen on the other side of it, and that's okay too. Like you have to be able to hold that. And again,

Greg:

for sure. Love it. Really appreciate everyone see the comments coming in. Really appreciate everyone being part of the the conversation. Love the comments coming in. And there's a comment from Jason about this idea that AI can't create the illogical or unexpected I think totally agree. Greg: AI is. Compiling. I do think that we will see a world where AI can, will create things that we can't create. I think the beauty is in, people are on the other end of what we create and they'll always want the human. I think there is a way to Take it with a grain of salt. And I think everyone's having that feeling right now. Yeah, which is I know I'm supposed to be faster. I know I'm supposed to use these tools in my workflow and be better or have more inputs. Let's not forget, let's not forget to give people the permission to like not feel bad for it. Greg: You like. We're in this in between time and just because it came from somewhere else, like it doesn't mean it's wrong. But I do think we have to ask ourselves a really important question, which is. Is it actually answering the pro is it answering the actual need and challenge that I'm trying to solve for and being able to really hold ourselves as creative leaders, as marketing leaders accountable to whether or not it's truly gotten there. Nate: Because I think this is, that tension of speed is intoxicating. It enables us to feel like we can. Be super human, but I also think the trap is to think we don't have to think anymore. This is there's this interesting duality and kind of tension there where we're like, you gotta be able to be willing to give your like. Nate: Take a beat and go, am I actually, does this answer the need? And again, not all content and

Nate:

Solving problems. Some come faster, some don't. But like I think if we continue to hold ourselves a as individuals to a level of responsibility in our ability to leverage these tools to come to great, to get to great outputs, it elevates all of our output beyond. The, a transaction or a or a deliverable to truly are we actually doing what we set out to do in the first place is the intent actually being met? Nate: I don't know if that's helpful, but something that I'm thinking a lot about, right? Like you can you can you can get lots of different type of copy out of out of these tools and things like that, but you have to hold yourself to a level of like. Excellence when it comes to what you truly deliver. Nate: So I think that's where I've been reading like Afic, I've been reading this fiction series and I was thinking about it the other day, which is like. I am appreciative of the author and the Now the interesting thing about that is I actually write now sitting where I'm sitting. Wouldn't feel the same connection to knowing that someone's like brainchild created this entire world and it's something that I can I can join them in. Because you're actually joining someone in their creation. Nate: When you do that versus going, this was pre-made for me based off of prompt, and I'm not saying one's bad or the other, like those are those real tensions that you're like, man, I don't know for sure. I don't know what that's gonna look like. Greg: Yeah. I think it's the same thing between there's. Greg: There's good art and there's great art,

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Greg Gibson

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Nate Spees

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