IDEAS

Automate the Work, Not the Relationship

Call me lazy, but if a computer can do something I don’t want to do, I am all for letting it. It can update the record, figure out who I haven’t talked to in six months and remember I said I’d call Mary when she got back from vacation. There are plenty of things a computer can do better than I can, and I have no need to prove my worth by doing them myself.

Then we get to the relationship itself and decide that’s the part we should automate. “Hi Mary! Just checking in!” She knows you aren’t just checking in. Your CRM realized it was Day 47 and sent an automated text (and not even from your number).

That division of labor is backwards. Technology remembers far more than I can. It can keep track of the conversation we had six months ago, the promise I made and the reason we agreed to talk again.

As my network grows, so does the work it takes to remember what matters to the people in it. I can care about 300 people. I can’t keep 300 lives, conversations, promises and important dates top of mind at the same time. Spending hours trying doesn’t make me more thoughtful. It makes me inefficient, and worse, it uses time and attention I could have spent showing up for you. Technology makes the work around the relationship more efficient so I have more of myself available for the part that requires me.

The conversation is different. I know things that aren’t neatly stored in a field. I can hear something in your voice that changes where the conversation goes. I can realize what I was calling about doesn’t matter anymore. I can listen, laugh, ask another question or shut up. That’s the part I want to keep.

AI makes this more interesting. The line isn’t really what technology can do anymore. It can write the email. It can “personalize” the message. It can probably sound enough like me that you won’t know I had nothing to do with it. The more it can do, the more important the question becomes: what do I want it doing?

I’m much more interested in using technology to remove the work that competes with my ability to pay attention. I think of it as hands off, eyes on. Take my hands off the tracking, sorting, searching and remembering while I keep my eyes on the person.

That’s the test I’d use before automating anything that touches a relationship: Does this help me show up better, or is it showing up instead of me? There are plenty of things I want technology doing. Being me isn’t one of them.