After spending time in a room full of business owners and creators this week, I noticed something interesting. Patterns.
The conversations people were having
The questions they were asking
The ideas that were energising the room
In this episode of The Hayley Osborne Show, I share three themes that stood out to me and why they matter for business owners like you right now.
I talk about the shift happening in the online world and why adaptability is becoming a real advantage. I explore the question every business owner will face in the AI era: will you show up as the expert or the intern? And I explain why clear positioning is still one of the biggest strategic gaps I see across businesses.
Tools and technology will continue to evolve, but the businesses that grow sustainably are led by clear thinking, strong strategy and confident expertise.
If you want to understand what smart business owners are paying attention to right now, this episode is for you.
SUMMARY
0:00:00 Intro & Context
0:02:00 Networking & QR Code Strategy
0:03:30 Theme Setup β What Smart Business Owners Are Paying Attention To
0:04:00 Rapid Change & New Tech
0:04:45 Adapting Without Burning Down Your Business
0:05:40 Fundamentals & Strategy Still Rule
0:07:29 Framing the Big Question
0:08:30 Expert vs Intern in Practical Terms
0:09:30 Human Perspective Still Leads
0:10:30 Negative Parallelism & Over-AIβd Content
0:12:00 What Strong Brands Get Right
0:13:00 How Clear Positioning Makes Everything Easier
0:14:15 Clarity + Creativity = Mic Drop
0:16:00 Future Tools & Invitation to Connect
0:17:00 Sign-Off & Energy
Hayley Osborne
Hello and a very warm welcome back in your ears to my podcast, the Hayley Osborne show. I’m Hayley, and I am your host. For those of you that are new here, a very, very warm welcome into my world. I’m going to just go straight into it, because I know that if you are like me, you run a tight ship and you have a certain amount of listening time, whether I hope you’re doing two things at once. So I hope that you are either driving, going for a walk, and you’re going from A to B somewhere, and you are educating, entertaining or upskilling yourself in the meantime.
So I wanted to share a little bit. So over the last week, I’ve spent time in a room with a lot of business owners, a lot of creators, and whenever I sit in spaces like this, something always happens. It is very interesting. And I often try to take a seat back and have a look at the patterns that I kind of start to see and notice and the conversations that people are having and the questions that they’re asking and the ideas that they’re getting excited about, and the common themes that happen when sitting in rooms like this. So you’ll know last week, if you follow me on my social media, I was at a conference, and I think these moments are gold, and I wanted to share some with you, because I think it’s really important. Sharing is caring.
You know, I do not gatekeep, okay? And conferences, I think they tell you, they give you signs of what is happening in the world. You know, for me, it was aha moments and ticks like, Yes, I’m doing the right thing. Yes, I’m leaning into this. Yes, I’m experimenting with that. Yes, I’m on the right track with what is happening in the world right now, and I think that they tend to reveal a lot about what people are thinking about. And conversations are actually quite open and quite honest now. What did help me is to have deeper conversations.
Was wearing a very, very fancy suit which attracted a lot of comments because it was bold and, and that’s the conversation starter, right? That’s the opener. And then I had, you know, if you’ve seen me recently, I’ve been rocking out with a QR code on my back to particular events, not all, but just somewhere I think is important. So there’s a lot of people in the room that I don’t know, because I think social events like being in the room that I was in are made to be social. Okay? And we often walk away and we think, Oh, wow, I didn’t really get to connect with as many people as I like. And I wish that I had made more friends or connected with more people on my socials, or what does that look like? And so I was like, You know what? Fuck this.
I really want to make a difference. I really want to make an impact. I really want to meet more people. And so that’s what I did. So go over to my Instagram and have a look at what I did. Not going to go into that now, that’s a whole nother strategy that I’m testing at the moment. Okay, so when you start listening carefully to what these rooms are saying and the conversations that are starting to happen, you will actually notice what matters in business right now. And that’s what I did. And I think I wanted to talk about three things that stood out for me very, very clearly, and they’re things that I think are worth talking about.
So the online space is shifting. This is the first thing, it’s shifting. But I think that the fundamentals still work. So the first pattern that I noticed was conversations around lots of change in the online world, lots of change in business. And I think people are talking about shifting platforms, new tools, new tech. And the speed of which everything is evolving, and it’s going quickly. So between chat, GPT, Claude and other things, I think it’s important to understand what each of these do, and we can go into that at another time, but how fast it’s moving, and how you know, how fast I think the speed of which business owners can get things done is going to be the game changer, and if we do it with our own voice and our own strategy, because it’s a pace, right?
We need to stick to it really, things are moving at a fast pace, whether we like it or not. And if you’ve done things like you’ve always done them, you’ll always get what you’ve always had. But if you start to change a little bit and morph and adapt to new things, you will be able to move the needle in a different way that you’ve never done before. And I think businesses that are doing it right now, they’re not scared.
They’re being adaptive to what’s happening in the world, and they’re refining what they already do now, if you are thinking, oh my god, Hayley, this is very confusing, and I don’t know how to connect everything, and I don’t know how to you know, all of these talk about new platforms, like, hit me up, send me a message in my DMs, and I would love to help you. Okay, but experimenting with these new tools is a must. It’s a necessity.
It’s not nice to have. It’s a need to have Okay, and then making sure that they’re anchored with your foundations and your fundamentals in your business is. Is it important, okay? Because they haven’t changed. The truth is, the fundamentals of what you do haven’t changed. And I don’t think we need to start thinking about burning down our businesses and this and that. You just need to morph it into something that actually is going to work. Okay? So clarity still matters more than ever. Strategy still matters more than ever.
Okay, just understanding who you are and what you do, ie, your personal brand matters more than ever. Platforms change. New Tech comes in. Algorithms change, okay, tools evolve. They always will be, and they will start to do it much faster. But I think that the businesses that understand that they know that they need to adapt while keeping their strategy intact and not not you know, going towards what somebody else’s version of great is sticking in your own lane. I think that that’s when you can continue to grow.
But if you think that you need to be this person over here and what they’re doing to be you and to grow, it will come crumbling down quicker than anything, say, quicker than batshit, but there you go. I said it, but I don’t think there’s a need to burn anything down. I think you just need to get creative. And that’s what great businesses do. They get creative. And think about when you started your business, how creative you were, to move the needle, to make a difference, to make change, that’s what we need to do. Now.
We need to experiment, adjust, and then you’ll see how quickly you evolve. That’s the first thing I wanted to say. Point two is in and around AI, and I want you to ask yourself this question, and this came up a lot in the room, in the era of AI, are you the expert, or are you the intern? And all I kept hearing about was AI, and all I kept hearing about was this, and it’s a fascinating time, because I think AI tools are becoming really capable.
Okay, with the likes of chat GPT, with the likes of Claude, with the likes of, I can’t think of the name of the thing that connects it all together, that does the work for you. They can, and I’m going to do that today, but they can generate content. They can help you with ideas. They can support your workflow, but they can’t do it if you don’t lean in and adapt. Okay? And the real question that stood out to me the most out of everything is, who are you choosing to be in this era of AI? Okay, are you going to be an expert, or are you going to be an intern?
An expert means that you are feeding your AI help with your zone of genius. You’re feeding it with your zone of genius, your queen, your crown. You know what you are good at and what you thrive at, or are you asking AI basic bitch questions? Okay, that will give you a basic bitch answer that will keep you as an intern and an employee of AI, okay? Or are you feeding it the right information to be able to help you to grow and thrive?
And what I mean by this is AI is a really good assistant. It honestly is, and I can’t help but thinking it is going to accelerate work and the pace that we can move at, which is great, but I think that when you’re an expert, it comes from your own human perspective, your zone of genius, what you are good at. You haven’t worked so hard to get where you are, for some robot to come and take your place. Okay? It still comes from being human, and it comes from experience, and it comes from being judged, okay? You’ve got to put that hat on, okay?
And experts lead thinking, not the other way around. Your AI tools do not and should not lead your thoughts. It is the other way around, okay? And then interns, so an expert leads thinking interns follow instructions and do what they’re told because they’re interning, they are learning. Are you an intern, or are you an expert in this space? I just hit the microphone. Sorry if that ricocheted in everybody’s ears. Okay? And I think the businesses that are going to stand out, are going to be the ones that help people to lead or little, I think I need a drink of water.
I’m so passionate about this, it really shits me off, because I see this so often, and it is something I spoke about last week on the podcast. Go back and have a look. Is that negative parallelism? Okay? And you can see that it is a dead set sign that someone is using a lot of AI in their content, and it’s boring. It is so boring, and I’m listening to a book at the moment that I’m seeing a lot of, and it’s boring me. It’s annoying me, because I know that the ideas didn’t come from that person’s head. Okay, now, if you are an expert, the tech that you’re using is going to amplify your expertise, and that’s. It is the way it is. It doesn’t replace it.
It amplifies it. And that’s the thing that’s going to differentiate, differentiate the great from the okay business owners. That’s what I think anyway. And so are you the expert, or are you the intern that came up a lot in the rooms that I was in? Okay? The third thing is positioning Okay? Positioning is still the biggest gap. So I think something I see heaps in my work, that the strongest brands in the room are clear. They’re clear about who they are, what they do, and who they help. They know their audience, they know their message, and they know fine art, how to communicate the value that they can bring to this world.
And I think that when you can do those and connect it all together, everything becomes so much easier. When your positioning is clear, your marketing becomes really, really simple, and your ability to then create killer content that cuts through and kicks us is heaps easier because you’ve done that hard work, and then you can train the little bots that help you to also amplify that, okay, not in turn. You’re not interning, you’re the expert, and they’re there to help and assist you, okay? And I think that then, when you can do that, your audience and your ideal clients, they see themselves in your message, and that’s beautiful. And when they can recognize that, that becomes really powerful, and that is your edge. Does this all make sense?
I think the moment someone starts to think, Oh, this is exactly what I need, everything changes. And that moment is created by how you position yourself in the market, your expert hat and how that marketing cuts through and that and whoever is listening, the one person on the other end of your message then goes, oh, I need this in my world. I love this human being who can help me. Okay? And it’s still the biggest gap that I see when I work with most business owners, okay? It’s clear. It’s not lack of effort, okay, it’s clarity. And then that clarity is in line with being creative, because it’s creativity as well. That’s like, oh, Mic drop. So they’re the three patterns that I notice most strongly in the room. Last week, I wanted to share them with you. I think the online world is shifting at a really fast pace, and I think the more that you can be adaptive to this, it will be your strength in business.
Now, if you are scared, if you don’t know, if you’re not sure of the right things to input into these programs, and let me tell you, I’m about to connect something that is going to help me absolutely move the needle in my world, and I will share it with you. Also, if you want in, just send me a DM. I love the chats. Everything is going to continue to change platforms. Ai, new tech tools are being developed overnight as we speak.
And I think the businesses that are leading by their own clarity and their own thoughts and a strong strategy will always find momentum and will always be able to think one step ahead. And I think that that’s something worth remembering. Thank you for being here. I know this was very direct, and if I hope, if anything, you know, I thought I’d bring the energy today by turning on my neon. So I’ve got this beautiful neon signage behind me that’s like fire. It used to be really part of my brand neon, but I’ve moved away from that because I just didn’t want to do the whole black background all the time. And that’s what you really need with neon to stand out.
But it’s still in my office, and it’s still a vibe and it is strong, and that’s what I want to leave you with today. Is strength and a firecracker up your ass to just get moving. I love you guys, and I look forward to hearing what you think about this podcast. Send me a message. I would love to know. I hope you’ve had a firecracker and have the best week, and I’ll see you next week or in my DMs. Okay, bye. See ya.
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