What Still Makes You Valuable in an AI-Driven World

Your value grows when you learn how to combine AI with what only you can do as a human.

Nikki Barua, author, speaker and CEO & Co-Founder of FlipWork joined me on Get Ready Before Before Life Happens to talk about how AI is transforming how we work, earn, and create value.

Nikki shares how individuals and advisors can stay relevant by reinventing themselves, developing AI fluency and focusing on the skills that remain distinctly human. From empathy and judgment to action and accountability, this conversation explores how to thrive in an AI-driven world.

Key Takeaways

🔹 AI is accelerating change and expanding what’s possible.

🔹 Reinvention is an ongoing process.

🔹 Knowledge alone does not create results, action does.

🔹 AI can expand access to tools, intelligence, and opportunity.

🔹 Empathy, judgment, coaching, and accountability become more valuable as technology advances.

🔹 Advisors evolve from experts to guides and accountability partners.

🔹 Investing in yourself creates long-term advantage.

🧠 Tony’s Take: AI amplifies human potential. You are your biggest asset. The opportunity is to use AI for what it does well while strengthening the judgment, empathy, curiosity, and relationships that only you can bring.

Connect with Nikki Barua:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikkibarua/
• Personal Website: https://www.nikkibarua.com
• Twitter: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikkibarua/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenikkibarua/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thenikkibarua
• Newsletter: https://www.nikkibarua.com/newsletters/reinvention-roadmap/subscribe
• Personal Website: https://www.nikkibarua.com/
• Flipwork Company Website: https://www.flipwork.ai/

Books:

• Beyond Barriers: How to Unlock Your Limitless Potential (Amazon)

Resources mentioned:

• FlipFactor™ Diagnostic: https://flipfactor.ai 

Bio: 

Nikki Barua is a serial entrepreneur, keynote speaker, bestselling author, and globally recognized expert on transformation. She is the CEO & Co-Founder of FlipWork, the human + agentic system for workforce reinvention.

For over 25 years, Nikki has helped global brands reinvent their culture, capabilities, and competitive edge. Her work spans strategy, digital transformation, and organizational change,rooted in a belief that people, not just technology are the key to future success.

Nikki has built and scaled high-growth businesses as a tech entrepreneur, earning accolades for her visionary leadership and impact. Her personal journey of rising from humble beginnings has made her a sought-after voice on resilience and reinvention. Her story has been featured in CNBC, Bloomberg, Fortune, and Forbes.

Nikki has been named Entrepreneur of the Year by ACE, honored as an EY North America Entrepreneurial Winning Woman, included in Entrepreneur Magazine’s 100 Most Influential Women, recognized as one of the 21 Leaders for the 21st Century, and celebrated as a Woman of Influence by The Business Journals, and Top Entrepreneur by Comerica Bank & LA Lakers.

👉 Start Your Financial Readiness Plan: A free, practical plan that helps you create your in-case-of-emergency Financial First Aid Kit, organize what matters, and prepare before life happens. Start Your Free Financial Readiness Plan  https://www.tonysteuer.com

👉 Support the Mission: Become a Get Ready Insider and receive access to the Get Ready Library while helping support my mission to help people prepare before life happens. Become a Get Ready Insider  https://www.tonysteuer.com/get-ready-insider

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:16

AI isn't just changing how we work. It's changing how we earn, how we learn, and how we think about value. Some see disruption, others see opportunity. Today I'm joined by Nikki Berua. Nikki, welcome to Get Ready Before Life Happens.

SPEAKER_00 0:34

I'm so excited to be here, Tony. This is going to be a great conversation.

SPEAKER_01 0:38

Yeah, I'm excited to have you and I'm honored to have you on the show. So tell us a little bit about yourself. What is your origin story and how did it lead you to focus on transformation in an AI-driven world?

SPEAKER_00 0:51

So the through line of my entire story, both life and career, has been all about reinvention. You know, as an immigrant who came to the United States with very few resources or relationships, I had to really figure out how to reinvent myself and become relevant and valuable in this market. And build up my corporate career helping the world's most iconic brands adapt to change and transform their culture and their capabilities using technology. And that's what I did for many, many years. And at the height of my corporate career, you know, I walked away from it all to pursue my entrepreneurial dreams. And, you know, in the last uh 15 plus years, I've built and scaled multiple businesses. Um, and so even as an entrepreneur, I had to reinvent myself again because the things you learn in corporate America don't always translate into who you need to become as an entrepreneur. And ultimately, the through line of all of that has been that change is constant and change is happening even faster and you know more um intense in terms of scope and scale, the only uh trait that is uh that helps you make it through all of these shifts is being agile and adaptable. And if you can figure out how to adapt to any kind of change and constantly reinvent yourself, align with the future, the opportunity is you know um limitless for you. And um, as you know, what has brought me to this place as uh the founder of Flipwork really emerged from that challenge that I saw that so many people around the world were struggling with, which is AI is changing things faster than anyone anticipated, anyone can keep up with. It's just not normal for us to deal with that kind of change. And yet we are not sure quite how to adapt to that change. And most of the solutions out there are basic AI training and basic AI tools. They're not preparing people to reinvent how they think, how they learn, and how they work. And that's what Flipwork was founded to, you know, help address and close that divide where you know humanity isn't getting left behind and replaced by technology. Instead, humans are amplified by partnering with AI and making us exponentially capable.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

That's that's amazing. And I think it's something that, you know, of course, everybody is thinking about this that this is top of mind. Um, some people are tuning out and burying their heads in the sand, and others are saying, okay, well, how do like I like you said, is amplify myself through AI. So let's, you know, maybe talk about that a little bit. If so, how does somebody think about that when you say humans are amplified by AI?

SPEAKER_00 3:45

Yeah, you know, when you think about our traditional ways of working and what made us valuable in the market, it was because you had a certain set of skills and you know, certain um, you know, competency that you had developed, some experience, some you know, expertise that you brought to the table. A lot of those uh areas are effectively what AI models can do better, faster, cheaper than any human can, right? So whether you look at software development, you look at financial analysis, you look at, you know, even things like copywriting, um, AI can do a pretty great job at it. You know, it produces generally sort of uh average to above average output. So if you are someone whose entire livelihood depended on doing the things that AI has now automated and can do it for basically for free instead of your six-figure salary, you've effectively made yourself replaceable, right? And and so the question then becomes if you know, if the machine can do it, you know, do what I had been doing, what do I do now? How do I reinvent where I create value, what kind of problems I solve, what makes me irreplaceable? That's the real question for people to answer. And the path to doing that is finding the areas that only humans can do and machines cannot do. So let's take, you know, being a financial advisor. Um, AI can certainly build financial models or maybe even like make, you know, uh design a portfolio based on your risk tolerance and all of those things because those are analytical computational things. But what it cannot do is look at your client in the eyes when they're going through a difficult circumstance of financial setback and you know um connect with them from a place of empathy and deep caring and reassure them and give them hope. That is something no AI model can do. And so when you think about what do you need to amplify, you want to amplify the thing that only humans can do. That is what um uh we that gives us a way to create value instead of competing with the machine.

SPEAKER_01 5:58

Yeah, and that that's something I've explored quite a bit on the podcast in other conversations. And of course, that's what a lot of you know, the conversation has been in the financial planning community is, you know, that fork in the road because AI models can do a really good job overall, you know, with creating a financial plan, which has been automated for the most part anyway, for years using uh different software platforms. So that's nothing new, but in terms of managing the portfolio and everything else, you know, AI is really, as you as you point out, stepping up with those things that were sort of, I guess, analytically based, if that's the best way to put it. But as you say, is that there's a role for humans as more of coaches. And that that is something that um I actually am releasing a uh episode this week is how advisors are transforming coaches. So do you think that mean, do you think that's the place where financial planners and other advisors should be thinking themselves as moving to more of a coaching viewpoint, uh being in the client's corner?

SPEAKER_00 7:11

Yeah, that that's a great question. And the analogy I would draw is very similar to fitness. You know, much like wealth creation, right? It's it's make more, spend less, invest the difference, right? It's pretty straightforward formula. It's not that complicated if you are consistent with that and you have, you know, uh compounding uh that keeps growing your wealth over time, you're kind of sad. So then why is it that people don't operate that way? You know, why do they make decisions that are counter to that? Because it's got nothing to do with the equation. It's got to do with the mindset, it's got to do with the condition, uh conditioning and limiting beliefs and so forth. And the same is true for fitness. You know, the the formula for you know being fit, physically fit, is like fewer calories in, more calories out, and you know, stay active, eat healthy, like avoid toxins, get good sleep. Like it's pretty straightforward. And you know, those even if you look at nutrition planners or meal planners, or you look at uh exercise regimens and all of that, there are lots of apps that can do that. Why is it people just don't follow the formula? Because it's not about the equation, it's about the mindset, about needing a guide that you that inspires hope and trust in you, someone who holds you accountable, guides you throughout the way. And that's why I feel like the this industry and this profession is going to move further away from the mechanics of it and more towards the relationship dynamics and the influence and accountability that like a human-to-human relationship provides. Um, you know, and and that's really frankly the hardest part to solve. Because if you know, shifting beliefs and mindset was easy, we would all be billionaires, right? Of uh, you know, just following the formula and doing the logical thing, but we don't.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Yeah. Well, and it's always been about the people, the most successful advisors that I know, uh, you know, attorneys, uh, financial planners, insurance agents, you know, whatever field you look at are the ones who are called rainmakers. And they've always been the people who have been able to form the best relationships, network the best, have always had those more, I guess, human skills anyway. And they've been the ones who've been most successful over the years. So yeah, I I definitely see it trending that way as well. Um, so you know, let's talk a little bit about, you know, financial literacy. Um, how do you see AI impacting financial literacy, access and inclusion in helping out there?

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Yeah, it's a very positive um uh move in the right direction because um access is no longer you know gating intelligence. And you know, when intelligence is freely available, you can have more abundance and and more prosperity. Um, what used to be the domain of only those with high net worth that could afford a financial planner or an advisor or you know, had access to certain investable funds and things like that, that just even you know knew where to begin, that's completely democratized now. Now you can ask ChatGPT for advice and at least know the basics of how to get started. Um, you know, it's no longer a limiting factor for people. So from a financial literacy, I'm extremely hopeful that this leads to more awareness, um, not just of what to do, but what not to do, that hopefully leads people to better decisions. The biggest challenge, as always, though, is not about knowledge, it's about action. Because all the knowledge in the world, even if you know you can get it for free from AI versus a paid financial advisor, isn't going to change your life unless you take action. And that is a personal prerogative.

SPEAKER_01 11:19

Well, and I think that circles back to what we were talking about a minute ago, that you know, the role of a coach is to get you to take action. And so I think that brings us back to that aspect of like, okay, well, that's where a human can fit in, is I know that we have a trainer. I know how to do the exercises and all those things. But it's nice to have a trainer come in every couple of weeks to hold me accountable, make sure, you know, whatever, uh, that I am taking action and I'm taking action correctly, because I think that's one challenge with AI, is that from what I understand, a lot of it comes down to the prompts that you put in. And if you're not, and that's my whole point with the show is to help people ask better questions. And I think the same thing is true of AI, is that if we're not asking AI the right questions, AI may go down a different path and is beneficial. I mean, are you seeing that as a potential issue with AI?

SPEAKER_00 12:23

It's not an issue with AI, it's an issue with uh humans developing the skills to work well with AI, right? It's uh like any profession, you have to build competency in new areas. So just like you know, my parents' generation did not have to work with computers, you know, for most of their careers. Um in my generation, I can't imagine doing any work without a computer, but that's a skill you had to learn, right? And and learning, you know, computational skills and AI is the same thing. I think because we're at early stages and you know, uh a very small percentage of the global population is actually, you know, developing the right kind of AI fluency, most of the world is still behind. And so until you master those skills, whether it's prompt engineering, whether it's learning how to you know automate workflows or build agentic systems, until you learn how to do that, um, you're not gonna get the full benefit of AI. And that's why building these skills, regardless of which industry you're in, has become table stakes. It's an urgent requirement because it's like going into a field where you don't speak the the uh most dominant language, right? You're missing a tool that is preventing you from not only being relevant, but actually creating more value for others.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

I I I love that. And that it is a skill that you have to pick up just like anything else, and that it's a valuable skill, and there's a price to pay if you don't know how to use AI. It's not like I'm an AI genius by any means, but I know how to work with it at least. And I know that, you know, for instance, with my wife and uh son, is that they asked me to use Chat GP to help them accomplish certain things because I've learned how to at least do a very minimal level of you know work with AI. And like you're saying, I can't create an agent or all those things. I probably could if I spent some time on it. But yeah, you know, my level is low, but you know, I'm able to access and at least get some benefit from it. And so I can see that.

SPEAKER_00 14:35

Um, so what and the thing that you know uh most people are not recognizing is that the AI model capabilities are growing exponentially week over week, right? Every week there's a new model version that gets released and it's way more powerful than the previous model and all of that. If you as you know, as a human compared to that machine, are not growing at that same exponential rate, then every week the divide grows bigger. This is not linear growth that's happening, that you can be like, oh, you know what? Um, I'll get around to it next week. I'll I'll learn some more skills with AI and develop my fluency. If you wait a month, you're a month, you're not just a month behind, you're probably more like 12 months behind because of that exponential like hockey stick growth of the models um and their capabilities. And that's the divide that we're seeing so much in our work, you know, uh with our clients. And we see lots of um, you know, professionals and experts that have decades of deep experience. And once they master these AI skills, the difference between them and the peers that don't have the same skill set is night and day. It is unbelievable how much of a competitive advantage they have. And that's why I believe that you know, in the next two to three years, we're gonna see a huge shift in where you know the market dominance lies and those that have like mastered AI fluency on top of their core competence and their expertise areas, and those that are still hesitating and waiting and um are still working with an old playbook.

SPEAKER_01 16:20

Yeah, I completely agree. And I'm even seeing it with some uh fintechs. Um, I've devised a couple fintechs, and so I kind of keep on top of the fintech marketplace and that you can definitely see that with a fintech sort of implemented AI, but in a very smart way. Um because I think a lot of companies, and I'm sure you've seen this, just throw AI in there and say, oh, we're using AI, but there's not really a plan for actually using AI besides saying we have an AI layer, which doesn't really mean anything. Um, so you know, one of the things is um a lot of people who watch and listen to the show are running financial literacy programs or they're developing financial literacy workshops or apps. Is how do you see them being able to introduce AI into their workflow or in how they should think about it in terms of financial education? Because I think for me, it feels like, as you said, is that could it could help more people gain access to financial literacy education?

SPEAKER_00 17:28

Yeah. Um this is uh regardless of what the nature of your work is, um, you know, everyone um follows the same process in terms of how to reinvent for AI. And this is really what our um, you know, our programs do is um number one, kind of break down your you know, work into tasks. So every like how you do your job day to day or how you work with clients, how you get clients, how you work with clients, how do how do you do a financial planning meeting with them, how you manage the portfolio. Break down each of those things into a set of tasks and then figure out which one of those tasks are naturally, you know, lend themselves to leveraging AI or algorithms or systems for. And then look at the pieces that only you can do. For example, that first meeting with a prospect, you know, who's looking to hire you as an advisor. Well, it has to be you, right? That meeting where a client is going through a difficult circumstance or you know had a windfall and wants to figure out what to do with it. All of those places are where you would like focus on leading with your own zone of genius. But then everything else lends itself to leveraging AI, even if you hadn't considered it before. What's constantly surprising to me is like people have been doing things a certain way and really don't believe they can leverage AI for it until you show it to them. And it's like, wow, this used to take, you know, 80 hours of work for you, and now it's done in less than one minute. Um, so you think about how much time it releases in your day-to-day when you break it down by tasks and think about what tasks and workflows that you want to use AI for. That is the time you want to reallocate to higher value activities. Your time is not valuable if you're sitting and crunching numbers on a spreadsheet, but your time is going to be super high value if you're serving a customer in need. Um, and so that time reallocation is a place to really focus on um, you know, investing uh your energy in.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Yeah, well, I think that makes a lot of sense. And as I'm thinking about people developing financial literacy programs and apps and you know, doing workshops, is that it allows them to create more programs to serve more people, that instead of doing a lot of that back-end creation work, is it they can be out there delivering programs and advocating for underserved communities, is you know, um in the US is where you know, even in the US, financial literacy is still very low. But when we look at countries around the world, there's a lot of countries where there's just completely underserved populations. Um, so you know, I think that AI can help reach those different communities. They can also help in the different types of learning.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

Uh, I mean, and that's why like, but often you can't, even if you know there's an opportunity, you can't get to it because you're so busy trying to keep up with what's already on your plate. So the first place to start is how can you release 30 to 40 percent uh additional capacity just by leveraging AI for you know, um doing those parts of your job. Because the moment you free up that kind of time, that's when the big question becomes well, how do you want to invest that time now? You know, what are the best uses of your time that you're passionate about that can serve your customers? You talked earlier about, you know, the role of financial advisors being more coach-like. But to be a coach, you need actual time. You know, you can't do that if your calendar is so packed you don't have time to meet with anyone. But that's an example of high value work that only you can do.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

That's awesome. Um, so I want to ask you a question. And if, you know, if you're not prepared to answer his question, that that's fine is, you know, as I think about this, is a lot of the audience around the world that listens to the show are either with a government financial literacy program, or they're people who work with governments to implement financial literacy programs. Is it how should governments think about using this to grow financial literacy in their countries? Because around the world, like the UN has a working committee that focuses on financial literacy, is how can they look, you know, and making sure that AI is really helping. The populations that they're supposed to be helping?

SPEAKER_00 22:03

Well, from the perspective of policymakers and for governments, uh, especially around the world, I think of it as a step even before financial literacy, which is the impact that AI will have on the economics of any community or society. Um, we're already seeing that in the US with the number of companies that every week announce layoffs or you know, um, or certainly hiring a lot less because they just don't need as much capacity to do the same amount of work. That has real impact on people, uh on their families, on their community. If you suddenly lose your livelihood, at that point you're not even thinking about financial literacy, you're thinking about survival. And when that happens at a pretty large scale, even if the long-term view is more prosperous in the short term, if you go through this pain of financial losses, that is an area that for policymakers, you know, that's the more urgent thing to figure out is how do we close the gap of displaced workers? How do you prepare young people that are graduating from college but finding it really difficult to uh to land a job because there's fewer entry-level jobs available today? Um, or you know, what do you do for an older population that could be at risk of getting laid off and may not be, you know, able to find a job again because their skills feel irrelevant. So there's multiple segments of the population that are at risk because of all of this. And that's the first place to start is how do you build policy for that? And once that part is done, then you know the financial literacy piece, I believe, will look very different in the next five to 10 years, given all of these shifts.

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah, I agree because I think what it can do is it can help integrate these programs and deliver them at a greater scale. Like we talked about earlier, is like one simple thing is in countries where there are people with different languages, is replicating the programs in a different language, because that used to take a lot of money to just translate it for lack of a better word, and recreate the program in a different language or you know, with captions, you know, for people who are hearing impaired. So that I think it does free up and that ability to serve more people and policymakers can think about it in that way as well. Um, so one of the things you talk a lot about is abundance, and I love that is you're optimistic about AI is, you know, because we've talked about right now, you know, is people losing jobs and things like that, is you know, why do you feel AI can create abundance and what's that going to look like practically for each of us?

SPEAKER_00 24:58

So um I think of abundance in three dimensions um time, intelligence, and access. So when you think about how AI creates abundance in terms of time, you know, um you're able to let go of all of the grunt work that used to take up so much of your day, all of the things that are repetitive, administrative, or routine. That time can be reclaimed from low-value tasks and actually go towards relationship building, creativity, you know, or even rest and recreation, right? Um that's the kind of abundance most people have not experienced before. You think about how many people go through, you know, their work life feeling burned out and feeling like there's no end, you know, that like the even the weekends are not enough reprieve from this. So just the gift of time abundance, where your job can be done in less time, um, and you have the choice of how you want to reallocate that is tremendous. Um, second, in terms of intelligence, um, you know, today, because of AI and the and it democratizing intelligence to so many different capabilities, uh, even a small business owner or solopreneur or financial advisor who works by themselves have access to like best in class business strategies, a marketing um campaign ideas, a financial modeling, or things that might have taken a whole team of experts to do before that they couldn't afford. And so for a lot of people, you know, they they were operating with just less. And so AI puts like this kind of superpower uh in reach for people who didn't have that before. Um, and then finally, I think of it in terms of access to opportunity that previously were, you know, they were gatekeepers by wealth or connections or location and all of those things. And so whether it was getting access to best in class financial advice or legal guidance or even health and wellness information, right? There was, you know, an access problem. And AI has solved that too. Like today you can truly get the kind of you know access to information and advice that you would only get if you were, you know, like working with Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley. Like you can actually get that kind of information, which is huge. And so to me, abundance, the reason I talk about it so much and why I believe in it so much is abundance is what happens when intelligence stops being scarce. And what AI has done is democratize intelligence, and that's what brings in that abundance.

SPEAKER_01 27:39

I I love that. I'm just making sure I know that uh abundance happens is when intelligence stops being scarce. And and think about it, and I know that I save time is one of the things that I do is if I don't know how to do something, let's say I'm building my website, instead of trying to go through all those help articles, I just ask ChatGBT, I'm trying to do X, how do I do it? And right then it gives me the answer. You know, I can say, give it to me step by step, and I get it, instead of having to spend 10 or 15 minutes poking around on, you know, my website's help page to figure out how to do something. So, you know, just from that, that's a tremendous amount of time. So, you know, let's talk about abundance just a little bit more from the sense of, you know, people, you know, some people's careers are going to disappear. And we've talked about that. Is how do people move forward and rediscover their identity and purpose?

SPEAKER_00 28:36

Yeah. Um, well, join flip work. All right. That that is literally what we help people do, and that's why the work is so meaningful uh to us is that you know, we are helping people um regain their sense of self and and their worth and value at a time where the market might have written them off and they look completely irrelevant, um, and there's no clear path forward. And so um, but but to you know, the point of all of this is reinvention is something that often people did when life happened to them, right? You got laid off or COVID happens, and or some other disaster strikes, and then you are forced to kind of figure a way out of that. What is really important to understand now is that don't wait for external circumstances to reinvent yourself. Do it to yourself because without that and without it being a continuous process, you are gonna get left behind. And and the path to doing that is really aligning to like what is the thing that is your unique zone of genius? In what ways can you create disproportionate value that no no one else and you know, not just competing with other people, but competing with machines cannot take away from you. And then how do you leverage the skill and speed that AI offers to use it to your advantage? In the past, you might have been only able to reach customers in your neighborhood or in yours, you know, in your local geography. Today you can reach people anywhere, and there's so many capabilities available to you. But for that, you need to build that skill, you need to shed the old playbook, unlearn the old ways, and really embrace what the path forward looks like.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

I I love that. That is so cool. And uh, you know, for people watching and listening, there will be a link to Flipwork so you can check out uh Flipwork.

SPEAKER_00 30:43

Um thing I would recommend everyone do is that you know, we have a proprietary diagnostic that measures AI readiness and it's incredibly powerful. Um, and it also uh, you know, sort of benchmarks your readiness against uh you know what the global averages are. Um that diagnostic is available for free at flipwork.ai. So I'd highly recommend that people start with that because not only will you know where you stand, but you'll know what your bottlenecks are, you'll know what's holding you back, you know where the biggest ROI opportunities are, and you'll get a 15-page report that tells you exactly what to do next. Um, so that's a fantastic place to start because you can't change something unless you know where you currently are.

SPEAKER_01 31:28

I love that. You can't change something unless you know where you are. Is you know, I always say that's like why on a map it always has you are here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Because if you don't know where you are, gold here.

SPEAKER_01 31:39

So I love that. If everybody watching and listening, there'll be a link in the show notes to the diagnostics so you'll be able to easily find it. Um, so one last question before we start to close out is why do you feel that empathy is an advisor superpower?

SPEAKER_00 31:58

Um because everything else AI can model. It can create a thousand different portfolio scenarios in seconds, right? Um, it can you know spot patterns faster than an individual can. It can build a really like advanced financial plan. Data can only tell you what someone has, but empathy can tell you what they fear, what they dream about, and what they're actually willing to do. And that's why, like, you know, what no machine can do is it cannot sit in the, you know, step into the shoes of a financial advisor. It cannot sit with someone and understand the complexity of their real life and help them feel that courage to like change and to take action and to hold them accountable through the process. That is absolutely irreplaceable and it's priceless. I mean, empathy is what turns financial advice from being just a transaction to being truly transformative. Um, and I've experienced it firsthand in my relationship with my financial advisor too. It's certainly not the modeling and the portfolio planning. It's that person I can call, you know, through the ups and downs, who knows me, who knows my life, who knows um how I'm wired and can guide me through that process and inspires trust in, you know, myself and my future.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

That's awesome. That's awesome. And yeah, I that's that's where I feel as well. Is that is something that you add to the conversation by just being there and listening to someone and expressing empathy and human emotions. Um, so to wrap up, uh Nikki, I have what's called the get ready hot take trio. These are three quick questions I ask all my guests. The first one is what's one money myth you're trying to break?

SPEAKER_00 33:55

A money myth.

SPEAKER_01 33:57

Um or AI myth. I'm sorry, what's one AI myth you're trying to break?

SPEAKER_00 34:02

Um Well, the the money myth, I would say, is that you know, what has uh been a source of value in the past is still gonna be true in the future. And I think this has been not just a step change, it's been a such a massive disruption that all the you know old playbooks are um really becoming irrelevant. And you have to rethink and understand what stays true and what has changed dramatically. Um when I think about an AI myth, um, it's that your seniority or your experience protects you. Um, and I think that is an area that where I've seen it, frankly, be the most shaky is that the people that have two, three decades of experience are in many ways more at risk because they've learned how to think and work and lead um in a pre-AI era and they've built credentials and competencies in a pre-AI era. And unless they make that shift and and bridge to the next, to this new world, um, they're really the most at risk.

SPEAKER_01 35:14

Yeah, that's that's powerful. And yeah, I that's and I think that really sums it up is you have to think about what you're doing, and as you've said, is all these different things about what you bring to the table, what AI can do, what it can't do, and figure out how to partner with AI, I guess for lack of a better word.

SPEAKER_02 35:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

So, Nikki, let's go back in time. If you could get out the time machine, if you could go back in time knowing what you know now about AI, what advice would you give your younger self about AI? Maybe I think, geez, Brian just have to go back two or three years, very radically different words.

SPEAKER_00 35:52

Well, I I actually uh, you know, uh got involved uh in 1997, so pretty early.

SPEAKER_02 35:59

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 35:59

Um, but it was nothing like what we have today. Um, but what that early exposure did for me was introduced me, for lack of a better way of saying it, a life form, if you will, or a form of intelligence that was so powerful that there was no doubt in my mind that you know the future is about this kind of intelligence. And um it it created, even though I don't come from a technical background, I'm not an engineer, you know, it made me fall in love with the power of technology and specifically um its ability to scale um, you know, impact and influence, you know, and and that is one of the hardest things to do is have impact at scale. And what I've always loved about technology is that it can scale your impact regardless of where you are, where you started from. Um, and so the advice I would give to my younger self is, you know, uh don't wait and see, jump in faster, jump in before you think you're ready. And uh times when I've done that, um my life has been so much better for it. Times where I've hesitated, I've missed that window of opportunity. And that's advice that is very relevant today for everyone who's thinking, well, I still have time, let me wait and see, let me wait until this is actually impacting my life or work. Don't wait. You know, this is the AI is about like rolling up your sleeves and you know, you gotta get your hands in the dirt. This is not something you're gonna gain competency or confidence in by reading about it. You just gotta build. And that's why my bet on the future is what I call the e-shaped builders that have multiple areas of deep expertise, but they have a level of fluency and confidence with AI to build things, uh, you know, whether it's agentic systems, whether they're orchestrators of AI tools, but they have a doer mindset, not just a manager mindset.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

I love that.

SPEAKER_00 38:05

So makers, not managers.

SPEAKER_01 38:08

Makers, not managers. I love that. I'm I'm just taking notes to make sure I get all these break points into the show notes. So, what's your number one tip to change the way we think about money in an AI-driven world?

SPEAKER_00 38:23

So financial advice has always been about build your financial life around assets, not just income, right? Because income can be disrupted, assets compound, and and all of that. But what we've traditionally defined as assets have been like financial assets or intellectual property or you know, um uh commodities, what have you. What I want to challenge everyone to think differently in the AI era um is you are your greatest asset. Because how you invest in yourself, who you become right now, has almost limitless potential. Because for the first time, we have access to a technology and a level of intelligence that is truly a superpower. And if you learn how to co-evolve with AI and become incredibly valuable and exponentially capable, you know, that is what actually gives you the greatest earning potential, the greatest access to what the future holds and a point of view on the world that other people might miss. And so uh, you know, rather than think of it just as other assets, you know, recognize you are actually the greatest asset right now.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

Yeah, well, that that's a wonderful place to close is because you are your best asset, is and you're the best at being who you are, as you know. I've done a couple of shows uh for people watching and listen. You've heard episodes on authenticity and being yourself. So um, Nikki, where can people learn more about you and flip work and most importantly, subscribe to your newsletter? We haven't talked about your newsletter by absolutely love your newsletter.

SPEAKER_00 40:08

Thank you. I'm so glad you enjoy my newsletter. Uh, you know, uh, first of all, um, I'd love to connect uh on LinkedIn. Um, and people can find me at nikkibarua.com, which is my personal website. Uh, you can sign up for my weekly newsletter, Reinvention Roadmap, where I provide really practical uh strategies for gaining uh you know relevance in the AI age. And then I'd invite people to take the free diagnostic at flipwork.ai. Um, check it out. It's gonna be hugely valuable and a great place to start in your AI journey.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

Awesome. And for everybody watching and listening, as always, there will be links to all these things so you can easily find them if you have access to the show notes. Nikki, thanks for joining us on Get Ready Before Life Happens.

SPEAKER_00 40:53

Thank you so much for having me, Tony.

SPEAKER_01 40:55

Yeah, it's been a pleasure and a great learning experience. And thank you, everyone, as always, for tuning in to this episode of Get Ready Before Life Happens. If you learned something today to change the way you think about AI and money, please be sure to subscribe and to share with a friend. You can also go to my website at Tony Stewart.com to join the Get Ready Movement and to receive my newsletter. Uh, if you want to support the podcast, you can now do so at buymeacoffee.com slash Tony Stewart. Until next time, let's change the way we think about money.