Valentine Gatard Future of Work: Workplace Agency from 15 Years Self-Employed

Valentine Gitard spent nearly 15 years self-employed in Paris researching the future of work, completing a master's in organisational studies at La Sorbonne and building a practice around speaking, coaching and hosting the Work Narratives podcast.

Valentine explains why French professionals increasingly refuse management roles, how two team members fought because collaboration meant 'respond immediately' to one and 'think before answering' to the other, and why human agency matters more as AI automates routine tasks. 

She describes vibe coding an agency assessment app on Lovable connected to Supabase, her research into narrative agency through Finnish researcher Hanna Meretoja, and her work with nonprofit Les Émergences on what they call the quaternary economy, a model where all forms of societal contribution are recognised. 

The conversation also covers the debunked tripalium myth about the French word for work and why community remains the most important resource for self-employed professionals.

Mentions and references:

Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari, Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber, Hanna Meretoja, Finnish researcher, narrative agency, Laetitia Vitaud, future of work author and Valentine's first podcast guest, Les Émergences, nonprofit promoting the quaternary economy and civic agency

Connect with Valentine: Website | LinkedIn: Valentine Gitard

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Transcript

Nigel Rawlins 0:00

I first spoke with Valentine Gitard on episode 29 I wanted to talk to her again because she's young, curious, and brings a European perspective on how our relationships with work are changing. Valentine is 38, based in Paris, and has been self-employed for nearly 15 years. She's just completed a master's at La Sorbonne and is writing a book on workplace narratives and agency. In this conversation, she explains why people no longer want to be managers, how the word collaboration nearly tore a team apart, and what it actually takes to make your own transitions through work on your own terms. This is the Wisepreneurs podcast. I'm Nigel Rawlins. Valentine, welcome back to the Wisepreneurs podcast. You were last on episode 29, which is back in February 2024. So welcome back. Can you tell us where you're from and some of the things you've been up to?

Valentine Gitard 0:53

Hi, Nigel. Thank you very much for having me once again. I'm very glad to be here. Uh, so I am from Paris, France, and I still live in Paris, which is where I'm very happy. And, what I've been up to, well, it's been an exciting two years, actually. Um, lots of things have been going on. Mainly, so I'm still working with, uh, companies and still thinking about our relationship with work. Still doing my podcast, being a speaker about these topics and, um, a coach, even though I don't use the word coach so much anymore. But I've been doing all that, and mainly I've also went back to school. I, uh, did a master's degree in, uh, organizational studies and theories at La Sorbonne, uh, which was very interesting, and I'm sure that we're gonna be talking about this as well.

Nigel Rawlins 1:42

Yes. I want to hear about your study. So what made you go back and do some study?

Valentine Gitard 1:48

So I've been, uh, working on the topic of the future of work for over a decade now. Uh, and I felt like there was something that would be interesting in looking at my topic from a different angle. Uh, because I've been doing conferences, I've been writing essays, reading a lot, and doing a lot of things in this ecosystem. And I thought it would be interesting to have a different point of view be- and also I had worked for a nonprofit called LAPÉROUSE which is, uh, rather famous in the French HR ecosystem. And I had actually produced their podcast for a few episodes, and I had interviewed researchers, like academic, uh, researchers. And, um, and something, I don't know, had clicked at that time, and I thought it was very interesting to dig deeper to, to look at things from, um, a different perspective and to, to make connections that are, um, different from what I was seeing in my usual environment. And so I decided that I would, uh, do that. I wanted to do a PhD. Uh, and it turned out that I had to do a master's degree first, which was actually a very good thing because it taught me lots of different things that I had to know about doing academic research. Um, and then I just decided to pause the PhD, um, project for, for just a bit to, um, to focus on writing a book. Uh, because when you're doing academic research, you have to focus on articles that have been written by academics and, um, and what I wanna write about is also a little bit more intuitive and maybe a little more creative, and I want to be able to quote people that are not part of the academic community. Um, so I decided it was more important, and also I want my book to be read, and my PhD will probably not be read by anyone. So yeah, because there are some ideas that I really wanna share with the world and, um, so, so there's that

Nigel Rawlins 3:48

So you, you've been very interested in the future of work for the last 10 years, and then you've taken the viewpoint from your academic studies. So how does that all meld together? What are your thoughts now on work and the future of work?

Valentine Gitard 4:03

Maybe what I talked about this last time, what has been really interesting is that there, there was something that was happening when I started thinking about the future of work, uh, over 10 years ago. I had started being interested in all this because I was working in a co-working space, and I was the first one of my friends to be self-employed. Uh, I was, um, around, yeah, 27 at the time. I'm, I'm gonna be, uh, 39 soon. And so, I was the first one to be self-employed. The people working in, in this co-working space were either also self-employed or startuppers or the types of freelancers. Uh, lots of people were working with their family, as I was at the time, um, as I was co-managing a, um, market research company with my dad. And, um, and I always quote this example. I had a very close friend there, who is still a friend, uh, who was working remotely for a company that was in, um, in another city outside of Paris, and they were paying an office space for her, and that was super rare at the time. So that was 2014. So what was interesting was that I was starting to witness all of these things, like all these different kinds of ways of working that, uh, I didn't see outside of this environment. And then I actually wanted to o open my own co-working space and, and I started meeting lots of people in this area, I mean, in this, ecosystem. And, so something was really going on. Something was increasingly happening around wellness at work. Things were being discussed about wellness, about happiness at work, which didn't last for too long. Um, and then, uh, COVID came, and so all the things that had, had been slowly happening and talked about in, um, I mean, in a- Interesting way, but not as a necessity as much, really started to shift. And then maybe COVID has accelerated things by maybe five years, I guess. Um, and then we started talking more and more about, uh, work-life balance, about how our lives are intertwined with work, uh, how we cannot dissociate w who we are at work from who we are in our private lives. And the words also started changing. Um, in French, it was interesting. We moved from lots of people talking about wellness at work from, uh, employee experience. Um, because I think the topic became more serious. Lots of people made jokes, I don't know if it was the same in other countries, but in France, um, the main joke was the foosball table. It was the butt of the joke. Um, like, like everything could be solved if you put that in a, in a company and people just started playing, which obviously was not, uh, the goal and not the answer by lots of people that were working in this area. Because I had started working for a nonprofit, um, called Happytech, which is funny because we never talked about happiness at work, but the nonprofit was called Happytech. Um, and it was gathering startups that had created tools for employee experience. Um, and I became the president of this nonprofit over, uh, over, after a couple years, and it was very interesting to see how engaged the founders were about these topics, and it was really not superficial. Um, and so we started talking a lot more about employee experience And, then things remained for a few years around, around this topic. I feel like things got deeper. Um, we started questioning more and more what work is, what makes us fulfilled. And obviously this is to be related to all the things that have been happening in society with the Me Too movement, with all the scandals, all the things that are being uncovered about toxic management or things like that. And today, I feel like I'm skip forwarding a little bit, but back to now, um, what I'm seeing most is there are a few trends that I think are interesting. We're talking a lot in France about how people don't wanna be managers anymore. This is quite a big trend. There obviously there is AI, uh, which is changing the game and making lots of people nervous. I, I'm, I'm guessing we'll talk about that later. And also what I've been seeing, as weak signals, as we, as we say, um, i- is that a lot of people are more and more talking about real work versus prescribed work. Actually showing the things that are actually done and what actually makes your day, and what work actually means. Um, and personally, I've been highly interested in debunking the etymology of the word work, um, because in French, travail, um, has this reputation that it's coming from a torture device that is called tripalium. It is actually not true. I had written about that in, uh, in my latest essay in 2023, and I was lucky enough to, uh, meet an incredible semiologist who wrote a whole book about it, and I did an episode with her, uh, last year. And there is an ideology about work that is suffering. Um, and I feel like collectively we're trying to build something different, because we cannot, we can no longer keep on working on a structure that was made for work over 100 years ago. Um, and because time is accelerating so much, with technological or, everything that's happening, obviously all the crisis, the, the wars, the demography crisis, um, everything has to be reinvented and sometimes it's very, um, nerve-wracking, uh, to be thinking about all these changes that have to be made. And I will end my, end my very long answer with that, um, is that I feel like there's something happening with how we can act collectively. We can change things. Um, I see things happening on a, on local levels more and more. Uh, I'm part of a nonprofit that I might say a few words about later. But, um, uh, there is definitely something going on, and I'm focusing now on the topic of agency. And people want to know what they can do, and these are my, my i- my areas of interest. But, um, there is definitely something happening with around the, the key themes of responsibility and action.

Nigel Rawlins 10:31

Well, I'm thinking that we're probably talking more about knowledge-type workers, people who are working with information and turning it into knowledge. But I guess there's all sorts of different work. There's still some factory work, I think, where people or workers who work with their hands now, you know, two of my sons are tradespeople. One's an electrician and one's a carpenter. So at the end of the day, they can see what they've done. But for those of us who, like me, I work in a home office, you work in a office, people have a job in buildings, they don't always see the results of their work, and they're bringing themselves to work. I know the tradies, end of the day they knock off and they're happy. There, there's no more thinking going on. They go and have a drink, they go and have their dinner, and then they get up early the next day and they're off again. That's a different world for them. But the world we're living in, the one where we're living in our heads, um, I think for a lot of people they, and, and I think you're recognizing, maybe more so in France and maybe here, but maybe it's here as well, that, you know, the world's not the same anymore.

Valentine Gitard 11:37

Yeah, absolutely. And I think this is very interesting and very important because there is definitely something that is going on specifically this issue of seeing what you've done. I know you interviewed Laetitia Vitaud who wrote a book about the importance of craftsmanship, uh, and how we can, we can integrate this into our own work. I often quote this example because I thought it was interesting. When I used to work in market research, I was always very much surprised when the clients were attending the focus groups that we were moderating and, um, and, you know, they were behind a one-way mirror and just watching the session go. And they were people working in marketing or or advertising. And it was very interesting because they were always so excited to see the people actually talk about what they had been working on. It made their work real and so I feel that this is really important, and maybe this is why we have longer and longer to-do lists that we can cross when we're done because we must, uh, understand what we've been doing, um, because I, I don't know if we as humans were built to sit on a chair all day behind a screen, uh, and then coming home at night, we're sitting on a couch and watching another screen. I don't know, but I think that I know that we were not. And that's also what AI is interesting these days, is that we are thinking that maybe it will give us some more free time to do other things and maybe build a different type of society. Um, but it's important to understand that there are some type of jobs that we talked about during the pandemic that, that were essential but actually neglected by society. Maybe they will regain power, um, and, uh, that they deserve the recognition, especially the financial and societal, um, because this is more tangible, this is more necessary. Uh, and we must not forget all the people that have no choice that are working in like 'click factories' that are training AI bots. I'm mainly talk about my ecosystem, which is, companies for white-collar workers. But it's very important to keep that in mind and to understand. I mean, one of the things that, that struck me, I think it was after we talked last time there was, um, retirement law in France, um, that was much debated, and there were thousands of people marching the streets to say that they were against this law that, that made them work until they, they are, uh, 64. And I thought that It was insane that no one in the public space was actually talking about why it is unbearable for these people to imagine themselves working one or two more years. Um, and I, I thought it was very, um, saddening actually, disappointing that no one was actually tackling this issue. I mean, why, why is it so awful for them? And how can we make work better? How can we change it? Uh, what is there to change? And I think we haven't solved this issue on a national political level, and this is definitely something that we should be thinking about.

Nigel Rawlins 14:50

So let's talk about the conference you're setting up and talking about work narrative and agency.

Valentine Gitard 14:56

The translation would be working together means overlapping our maps of the world. Um, I worked on it last year, and I actually, um, made it better after my Master's because I knew more about, uh, agency, and so I thought I was, um, giving it, um, a nicer twist. And so basically what I'm talking about is that, uh, I'm opening with the fact that each of us carries a personal representation of reality, it's shaped by our history, by our culture, our beliefs, and our experiences. And what do I call a map of the world is, uh, how the world guides how we perceive, interpret, and often sometimes we act even w- without realizing what we are doing because it's, like, ingrained in our, in our brain and in our body. And, um, and so we all have our different maps of the world, and they, sometimes they overlap, they dialogue, sometimes it's, it's what's causing tension because we don't understand the same things. We don't see the same things. The facts are here, um, but we have our own perception of reality. And so I thought it was really interesting because, as you know I read uh Sapiens by Harari a few years ago, and it really struck me to read that, everything that exists uh in the world is actually fiction. It's stories that we tell ourselves, that we decide to believe together. All the states, the money and even a company actually is a story that we decide to, to believe in, uh, collectively to make something happen. And, um, but what happens, um, within these walls is actually real life, our emotions, our interactions, our communication. And, um, and so what I'm saying actually in this conference is to talk about all this narrative arc and what we're seeing. There are lots of authors that have written about this and the, the power of fiction, the power of narrative, and how as a human species we are built and we're shaped um by these stories. And so it's important to, to understand, uh, how different we are and how this difference can actually make us better and more interesting and more creative, but to really come and understand how we can, um, understand each other better. Like for instance, I, uh, I often give this example that sometimes we don't have the same definition of a same word, um, and it is what actually makes us not be able to communicate or work together. This is an example I gave in my conference that I worked with a, with a team and two, two members of the team thought they were able to collaborate, because collaboration didn't mean the same thing, uh, for each of them. For one, it meant, uh, answering very quickly, uh, being, being right there, being available all the time. And for the other, it meant thinking about answering, thinking before responding, and taking time to give a proper answer. And so they each had a very different definition of the word collaboration. And when you don't explicitly share your definition of a word, of a way of working, of a concept, then, I mean, you just start fighting. So it's lots of different things about that. So it's mainly about this in the first part, and then the second part is about agency. So, um, agency in French, it's actually interesting because it's a word that no one knows. It's agentivité, and, um, it's a very uncommon word. Whereas in English it's part of the common vocabulary. And, um, so whenever I, I talk about this, I have to explain it, that it's the capacity to act with conscience and autonomy, on yourself and your environment. And so it's very interesting because very often people ask me, "Oh, is it related to AI, to agentic AI?" And, uh, and I'm, I'm like, "Actually, yes and no." Um, yes, because it's about autonomy and action, uh, for both. And yes also because in the time of AI, it's really important that we develop our own capacity, human agency to act and do things, because I'm really talking about what as humans, uh, we can do and how we can be aware of our environment and, how we have to be also aware uh of the actual um room we have for change because just wanting to act without knowing what you can actually do is pointless. So it's all about what agency is, why it is important, how we can develop it. And, it's also about narrative agency, uh, which is a term that I, um, that I stumbled upon in my research, uh, was coined by, um, a researcher called Hanna Meretoja from Finland. And, um, and it's very interesting. It's about how we can navigate through the implicit narratives that are in our lives. And how by becoming more and more aware of the narratives that surround us, we can actually have some power over them, and we can then act and do things. I won't go into too much detail about that, I mean, I, really like talking to people about these topics and, um, they are interested because they, they do want more responsibility and autonomy, and they wanna understand more what's going on. Um, and it's really important. It's also related to critical thinking. I did a very interesting episode with an historian and sociologist about the word 'Otium', which is a Latin word for intelligent leisure. And, it's also one of the key things that we need to cultivate to nurture our human agency.

Nigel Rawlins 20:44

So really what we're talking about is in a workplace, the world really has changed from the simple small villages, we became an agricultural society, then cities grew. We have millions of people living there. Some people work with their hands, but there's a lot of people now working with their heads. They're in an organization, and you were saying that some people don't wanna be managers anymore because they don't wanna tell people what to do. But people have still gotta do something in those organizations. So they've obviously been given a job, and I worked with a former Hewlett-Packard marketing manager for many years. He was my mentor, and he used to say that when he was working in his job, he was so organised at doing it that he got it done in two days, and he hid for the other three days. And I must admit, I worked for a university for a little while, and I did the same. I went and hid in the library because- Mm-hmm you could do the job. And that's the nature of some work. What was it the, the guy who wrote about the bullshit jobs that, you know, you- Yeah,

Valentine Gitard 21:47

David Graeber.

Nigel Rawlins 21:48

And some jobs are just really boring and and pointless yeah, but that's the world we live in, and that's really what you're talking about, is revealing that the person in there is, has got their thoughts on it, plus they're worried about the world. They're worried about their family. Um, they're worried about whether they're gonna have a job or not and, and plus a whole lot of other social things that are going on. A, a lot of people in Australia actually work for the public service, and a lot of them work from home. So they don't even see other people. I don't know what they do, whether they're working or not, whether they're productive or not. I, I guess they just get their thing that they have to do, and they do that. But a lot of that is gonna be automated, I'd say, if it's fairly simple form filling or checking forms or things like that, which is basically clerical routine tasks, which still need to be done, but probably could be automated. Where's the work then? You know, at that point, that's where you're talking about the agency and talent and people solving real problems. Mm-hmm. You know, filling in a form, whether somebody's gonna get their Social Security payment or something like that, that's important, but it could easily be automated, couldn't it?

Valentine Gitard 23:03

Yeah, absolutely, and this is what actually is, uh, happening, um, and what is scaring people, is that lots of jobs can be automated. Obviously, lots of jobs all are gonna be replaced, but of new jobs are gonna be created, and maybe this is the optimistic, uh, person inside of me, uh, talking, and I'm always positive, even the world is very scary sometimes. But there are gonna be new jobs, and also we are, um, maybe gonna focus finally on what actually makes us human. And maybe it's gonna be more and more about empathy and actually I'm hearing more and more the word love in professional spaces. This is something that we need. We need to nurture it. We need to focus on love because this is the only thing that AI will not steal from us, even though some people are already falling in love with their bots, but that's another issue. And this is also actually what we're thinking about and trying to build in the nonprofit that I'm working for now. So it's called Les Émergences, which could be translated by Emerging Futures. And, it's really focused on, uh, what is called the quaternary economy. It aims at collectively imagine and build a desirable future society. And we are actually promoting civic agency. And that is each person's ability to act together intentionally for the common good. And, um, it's trying to really create the conditions for, uh, individuals to engage in activities that are not necessarily profitable in the traditional sense, um, but that are essential to society. And its objective is to rethink social contribution and to open the way toward a quaternary economy, uh, which is a model in which all forms of societal values are recognized and supported. So we are actually shifting what work means in this new model of society. Working is about how much you contribute to society. And maybe somehow AI will allow us to go that way. I mean, th- this is what lots of people are talking about, like, uh, we're gonna work less and things like that. Some are very skeptical about it, uh, because it's already been proven that right now AI is not making us more productive really. It's not making us work less. It's making us work differently, for sure. But we are spending a lot of time, there's a lot of cognitive load related to AI tools. So it's not a perfect world yet at all. But maybe if we act responsibly, we can pave the way toward a world where this is working. I mean, obviously, I'm not, uh, naive. There are some people that are not interested in this kind of society and who are appealed to greed and financial power and, uh, things like that. But it's, it's all the same, you know? Like, we feel like on a international level and a global level, things are really dire And when we think about what we are seeing locally, we see lots of people gathering for for the greater good. This is what I think to myself when, uh, when I feel a little desperate. Uh, I think of all the people that surround me that are convinced and are, are actually doing the things, doing the work. So, I think this is at the same time very scary, uh, and at the same time we still have some agency to find our way through this mess and chaos.

Nigel Rawlins 26:44

So what you're saying there is some people are just self-organizing to, to solve particular problems. They're getting together and dealing with an issue. And I'm thinking there's probably an awful lot of people like myself who work from home. Um, like I do a lot of writing basically, and I put it on my website to, to try and help people, you know, think about marketing, think about business. It's not something that I'm selling. I'm trying to be helpful. So there's probably millions of people out there doing that. Mm-hmm. Putting on podcasts, putting on YouTube videos, and that's why I wanted to talk to you, 'cause I wanted to get your European perspective, um, 'cause Australia is very English. Well, we're not like England anymore. Mm-hmm. But, um, we speak English, you speak French. Mm. And, and you're speaking a lot more English now anyway, aren't you? And you're writing in English too. Uh, is your podcast in English?

Valentine Gitard 27:34

It's in French. Um- French I only did maybe one or two episodes in English, but I, I wanna do more, and I, I- Okay launched a new newsletter as well, and, uh, I'm hoping to get it translated.

Nigel Rawlins 27:44

What I was talking about was, um, that there is a lot of work out there that people can self-organize to get things done. They're not necessarily paid for it, so they, they still need some sort of paid work. But obviously at some point, um, we're gonna have to, uh, figure out what sort of work people can do, 'cause if AI does start automating tasks, then the tasks that need doing are probably the, the things that only humans are good at. Before we started the podcast, we talked about how you were personally using AI, and I think that's also reflective about where I think AI is going to go, especially for the self-employed or the independent professional. So let's go back over that. How do you use it yourself personally?

Valentine Gitard 28:30

Well, like everybody else, I started, I think, using ChatGPT when it was first released uh, in, was it, like, 2022? Um, so I started using it a little bit, and then I started using different kinds of tools. And what I was saying just before we started recording was that I thought it was very interesting, um, because it was helping me in areas that I'm not necessarily an expert in, uh, but things that I've learned how to do before AI was a thing. And so for instance, when I still do market research sometimes, I used to be a translator, I don't use it so much for writing, um, very rarely because the more I see people writing in the AI style, the more I wanna write everything myself. I, I actually enjoy writing, so mainly for reports or for quick things, even for things that are medical. I use it for lots of personal things that I'm familiar with and professionally I can assess if it's giving me something interesting or not. Which is very interesting because I feel like I've learned how to do things and now I can be the judge of how qualitative the work of the bot is. I mean, it's, it's incredible. I mean, it's great and sometime I like to have like a sort of discussion with it to help me think through something. And I, I think it's very interesting. However, I like to think and I like to know what I'm thinking. I reflect a lot on, on what I do. And sometimes I'm caught up with it. Like, I feel like maybe this is too much and maybe I should take a pause, and I, I worry that I need to keep on working on my, um, cognitive skills. But I think that it's really interesting. It's also very interesting for tech projects. Um, I do a little bit of automation work, uh, either for me or for clients. Very recently I started partnering with someone, and we were doing trainings, for managers to grow their agency. And, we had this kind of quiz, um, where we wanted them to assess how agentic, basically what their style of management was. And so I vibe coded an app on Lovable, and connected it to Supabase to get the results, and it was, uh, very interesting, very exciting, and I did a lot of things that I wouldn't have been able to do without it because I'm not a professional coder. Um, and so that I thought was very interesting. It hel- it's helping me launch things that have been on my mind for years and I haven't been able to create. Although the annoying thing with ChatGPT, for instance, is that, um, you have an issue, I was working on an automation between Notion and Make, for instance. And, um, you're saying what your problem is, and then it's gonna tell you, "Oh, okay, it's not working, but I have the perfect solution for you," and it's not the perfect solution at all. Um, so I think I lost some time trying to figure things out with it. Uh, and then, you know, I ended up talking with an expert, a human expert, and it saved me maybe 10 hours. So I think you really always have to find the right balance. Um, but it is incredible. I mean, it is very interesting when you're in doubt, when you wanna challenge your ideas, when you wanna look at things from a different perspective and more global perspective for research, it's amazing. I started using tools when I was doing my master's, for instance, last year. Um, I was able to find papers that I wouldn't have been able to find otherwise. Um, also there are tools that connect papers with one another. Mainly for research, it was incredible, and it was also very interesting when I was struggling to understand, um, a few very tricky concepts. Um, I was really able to have a discussion with it and, you know, I could chat with a PDF, uh, and ask questions and relate it to my own research. But then I really wanted to write everything myself, especially for the field results, uh, because, I mean, I had felt things. Uh, and yes, it has helped me sort through, uh, all the documents, um, helped me in my analysis. And it would be hypocritical to say that I'm not using it, and I guess that in a few years we won't say we use it, like we don't say today that we are doing a Google search. It's just part of our new routine. Although again, to go back to what we were saying before, like there are lots of people on earth that are not using AI at all. But yeah, it's, it's a very interesting tool. The annoying thing I feel is that every day there's something new. You could spend all day long, uh, watching YouTube videos, reading articles about the new shiny object. Um, so I think it's important, and this is what I try to do, to find one that I'm comfortable with, um, that I try to master in some way, uh, to really see if I really need it or if it's just because it's exciting. Um, I'm a little annoyed also by people who are saying, "You have to do this, and you have to use that." Thank God there are things that we don't need AI for. Um, so again, it's all a matter of finding the right balance, and not being suffocated by the noise, um, around AI, even though it is happening. It is scary. It is changing lots of things in organizations. Um, people are gonna be laid off because they won't be useful anymore because they were doing things that will be automated. I was talking with someone recently, I mean, just before I started, uh, going back to school, so that was maybe a year and a half ago. And he has, um, a consulting business, a very small one. And he has three computers working nonstop, uh, doing the work that former consultants used to do. But he has three employees that he does not want to lay off because, um, he, he wants to find a way to make it work between the machine and the humans. Obviously, not all companies can afford these type of things, especially because AI is also expensive. It's gonna become more and more expensive. Today it's not really expensive because it's still the beginning. I was attending an event the, uh, last week, and they were saying it was like Uber at first. Like, they wanna gather lots of clients, and then all of a sudden the, there's going to be a price surge. Um, and so there are things that we won't be able to do. But, yeah, it's, it's a matter of, like I was saying for, uh, regarding narrative agency, about navigating among the waters of everything that is going on. And I think it's important to acknowledge that people are scared, um, and to help them understand the risks and also the opportunities of what is happening.

Nigel Rawlins 35:28

Well, I think that's interesting what you're saying there. From a professional point of view, because you have some deep knowledge, that you're able to work collaboratively with it and interrogate it to get meaning. But you also know that it can do other things that you want to do. So it's actually improving maybe the things that you want to do. I know that I'm doing a whole lot more than I could possibly do. For example, for a lot of my writing now, I've been taking notes for many, many years, and I fed them into a note-taking app, and I'm able to feed them into Claude, and manipulate those notes and work with those notes to craft what I wanna say. But I also know that the next day or next morning I'll come in when I get up, I've been thinking about stuff, and I'll feed that in too and say, "Look, this is not really what I'm trying to say here. This is not following the thing." So we can bring our expertise to it. Mm-hmm. And, and I think that's very powerful for the person who works on theirselves. So do you still work for yourself or, or do you work on a number of projects?

Valentine Gitard 36:34

Well, I'm, I still have my own company. Uh, so I'm still working, uh, by myself on a number of projects. But I'm partnering with other people, on new projects actually. So the one I did the training for managers recently with. We are thinking of maybe building something together, uh, that's gonna be aside our own businesses. And there are, um, yeah, different, different things I'm thinking about what I'm doing these days. Mainly by myself, which is actually for the first time in years actually since I've started working. I've been feeling a little lonely because I used to be in a co-working space. So the one that, uh, actually led me to be interested in the future of work. Uh, it actually closed last year, uh, so I don't have a proper office space anymore, and I haven't been able to find one that actually, that really suits me. I used to have my collective with other podcasters, so that was a two-year project. They're still my friends, and we still talk a lot about our work, which is great. Uh, they're like colleagues. Um, but I don't have that many projects that I'm working on with, uh, partners, so there's, there's new one coming up that I'm very excited about, and obviously there are my clients that I'm really excited to be working with. I sometimes still work with my dad, but more occasionally. And, that's why maybe sometimes it's nice to have a chat with AI- to challenge my ideas. Um, but it's, I mean, nothing compare, compares to a human conversation.

Nigel Rawlins 38:00

Now, isn't that interesting? So basically you've got a portfolio of things you do that earn you income, and, and I think that's probably the ideal, isn't it? That, you know, for some people it might be they have a little part-time job where they work in a restaurant or something like that, and they, they've got some expertise, or maybe they do some other manual work. And, and I think that's probably, um, a direction that work's gonna go in. And I worry that when we talk about people who are in a workplace and they're unhappy with that workplace, and, and I think you're right about people having different definitions of what things mean, and it definitely leads to conflict in organizations, or they're frightened. What do you think about leaving an organization and going out and doing what you're doing and working for yourself? What would people have to do to be able to do that?

Valentine Gitard 38:50

Well, it's a question that less people are asking themselves at the moment because the rise of freelancers is still going strong. Very recently we were having lunch, like a networking thing and, uh, I was with, um, with a director of HR who was thinking about leaving her company and, um, and building her own. And we were debating, um, if it was a right move for her and what she should do, uh, because more and more people wanna leave companies, uh, which at some point might be an issue. But, um, we were telling her, because we're three self-employed women with her, and, uh, how much it's about- multitasking. Uh, it's about not really focusing on your expertise so much as developing so many more skills. Uh, you have to run the company, you have to do your marketing, your communication, uh, sales. There are so many jobs that you have to do, and, um, you don't actually spend that much time doing what you're paid for in a, in a company. So I think it's very important to keep that in mind, that there is a whole palette of things that you're gonna be doing if you're, uh, deciding to be a freelancer. And also, it's a struggle. I mean, I love it. I've, I've been self-employed for almost 15 years. But it's a, it's a rollercoaster. Uh, and everybody I know, every single person I know who is self-employed is saying the same thing. And sometimes you forget about it. Actually, recently I was not at the top of my game, and I was thinking, "Oh, this..." I'm, I was worried, and actually a couple weeks later, everything was fine. But it's, it's the just how the game works. So you have to be prepared, for sure. Uh, I mean, I have lots of people, so I was telling you just before that I was the first one of, of my friends to be self-employed. And now I have a few friends more than a few, um, who are self-employed. And, uh, and so we share, we share that. We share the struggle. And I think the main thing is to be surrounded by people who understand you, uh, who can help you to find a community. As I was telling you, I was feeling a little lonely. But it's the first time it has happened to me in 15 years because I've always had it's some sort of community around me, some people that I, I can talk to, people that support me, people that I can share ideas with. Um, and, uh, I think this is really, really important.

Nigel Rawlins 41:21

But you've been going for 15 years, so you must be doing something right. Yeah. Yeah. But I think you're right about, um, the loneliness part. I guess if you're very busy all the time in your work, you know, if you're getting paid work, that'll keep you busy. But that'll burn you out fairly quickly if you don't have any, um, people around you or be able to talk to people. Are there any other issues you'd like to bring up before we finish?

Valentine Gitard 41:47

Well, maybe, uh, one thing just to, go back to what you just said. It's important to keep in mind that there are lots of things that you're gonna be doing if you're a self-employed, uh, that will not be paid. Uh, you're gonna spend a lot of time networking, uh, meeting new people, working on your offer. I mean in my case, writing, reading, podcasting. Yeah, you have to, to be sure about what you're doing, I guess, um, and to know what you're doing this for. Um, and maybe what I wanna add is that I hope that I can continue doing that, even, even if I'm open to any opportunity that might come my way. As, as we said throughout our discussion, the world is changing super fast. And I'm always eager to learn new things, to discover new projects, new people. Um, I have tons of ideas. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to do everything, to implement everything, uh, which is very frustrating. But, um, yeah, I think maybe to sum up what I said is there are reasons to be very scared about what is going on in the world of work. But there are also things to be, um, positive about and optimistic because there are people thinking and working on creating a brighter future. So maybe I, I guess I would end with that.

Nigel Rawlins 43:14

Yes. I think that's lovely. Valentine, thank you very much for being my guest, and, it was lovely talking to you again.

Valentine Gitard 43:21

Thank you so much, Nigel. I was very happy to talk with you as well. Right.