The Power User Gap for financial services and insurance
88% of your people use AI. About 5% use it well.
In financial services and insurance the split shows first in the documents that have to be right: policy wording, client communications, regulatory reporting. The work is finding what can be handed to AI inside the rules, and teaching your people to do it there.
For whoever is responsible for getting non-technical people using AI. Nothing to code.
71 talks and 75 workshops in 34 countries since 2014. Google Developer Expert, Agentic AI Foundation ambassador.
You see what changed, team by team.
The people attending say how they use AI before anything is taught, and what they hand to it after. It works with whatever tools you've already bought. Remote or on-site, so teams in different countries get the same teaching without anyone flying anywhere. No pre-work for attendees.
A 30-minute call
Where your rollout is, and which teams or workflows you'd like to start with.
I look at how your teams work
I talk to the team leads and go through the process documents for the workflows you've chosen, and suggest others where I see a better place to start. How long it takes depends on the scope we agree.
A baseline before anything is taught
The people attending say how they use AI on those workflows today and how that work gets done. That is the mark everything after is measured against.
I teach your people to use AI there
Remote or on-site, for the people who haven't worked it out yet. They learn to use AI on those workflows, so they do that work more efficiently and AI becomes the first thing they reach for. Your power users are welcome to join.
What changed
After the teaching, the same people say what they now hand to AI and where they still don't. You see the change against the baseline, team by team, and we decide where the next cohort starts.
Same task, same tool, two different jobs.
What most people send
Write a summary of this report for the leadership team.
What your top 5% send
Here is the report, and the three slides the board saw last quarter.
Summarise it for our leadership team, who already know the background and want what changed.
One page. Lead with anything that moves a number. Flag anything you're unsure about rather than smoothing it over.
Nobody taught anyone the second version. The people who write it worked it out on your documents and your approvals, which is why no vendor course covers it. I teach it on your own work.
Why the gap is still there.
You have probably tried some of these already. This is what each one leaves you with.
The vendor's own course
Teaches the product: the features, the modes, what the assistant can do. Your power users didn't learn there. They worked it out on your documents and your approvals, which no vendor has seen.
An e-learning platform
Produces completion rates. Everyone finishes the module, and on Monday the same one-line prompts go out as before.
Your own power users
They can show what they do, and they often will. They can't see where their habits came from, and they have their own jobs, so the rest of the team gets a lunchtime demo and a link.
A generic AI trainer
Runs the same day for every organisation, on prepared examples. Here the teaching starts from your workflows, so what people practise is the work they go back to.
Where the gap shows up first.
The same split appears wherever the licences went out to everyone. This is the work I'd start with.
Financial services and insurance
Policy documents, client communications and regulatory reporting, where the tools have to be used inside the rules. The work is finding what can be handed over without moving the line on accuracy.
Professional services
The first draft of a client report, the research behind an opinion, a proposal that has to read as if a partner wrote it. The 5% already hand these over and check the result. Everyone else still starts from a blank page.
Technology and telecoms
Engineering got the training and the rest of the company got the licences. Sales, support, operations, HR and legal are where the gap is widest, and where most of the hours are.
Who is in the room
The people who have not worked it out yet, whatever their job: customer success, sales, support, operations, HR, finance, legal. No technical background, and nothing to code. Your power users are welcome, and it works with the tools you have already bought.
If your rollout has not started yet, the teaching works just as well before the licences go out. Your engineering team is different work: the Agent Workshop teaches them how agents are built, by the same person, so one conversation can cover both.
What they leave able to do
They use AI on their own workflows to do that work more efficiently, and reach for it first in their day-to-day work.
What else the engagement can include.
A talk for the whole company
The split, shown to everyone at once, so the teams being taught know why before the teaching starts.
Talks for leadersMore cohorts
The same teaching for the next teams.
Briefings for managers
For the managers of the teams being taught.
Follow-up clinics
Time with the people who attended, on what they run into back at work.
Change management
Working with whoever owns the rollout on the change around it.
Agents in the workflows
Putting agents into the workflows we reviewed, for one person, one team or the organisation, as extra work alongside the teaching.
Before you book
- Do attendees need a technical background?
- No. This is for the people whose job is not technical, and nothing in it involves code. The people who do write code are better served by the Agent Workshop.
- Which AI tools does it cover?
- ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini, whichever you already pay for. The work is finding where it can do real work in your workflows, then teaching people to use it there.
- What do attendees need to prepare?
- Nothing. There is no pre-work. The scoping happens between us before the teaching.
- Who should be in the room?
- The people who have not worked it out yet. Your power users are welcome to join, and they usually do.
- Is it recorded?
- No. The teaching is live, on your own workflows, in your room or on your call.
- What does it cost?
- It is quoted against the scope we agree on the call. Nothing is priced on this site because no two organisations need the same amount of work.
Who you'd be working with
I've spent twenty-five years teaching engineers and their organisations whatever technology had just arrived, and the last few building with these tools.
Google Developer Expert in Web Technologies, Agentic AI Foundation ambassador, MBA. 25 years across software engineering, developer relations and technical training, and 146 talks and workshops in 34 countries.
More about meStart with a 30-minute call
Tell me when the tools went out and which teams you'd start with. It's a paid engagement, and I quote once we've agreed the scope.