AI is Changing How We Work. How Are We Changing With It?

By Tanya Gawthorne, facilitator, strategic planning consultant, and Founder of Balanced Consulting

There is no shortage of conversations about artificial intelligence.

We are being told which tools to use, how AI can improve productivity, what it might mean for our businesses and professions, and why we need to keep up. Alongside all of this advice and enthusiasm are equally strong concerns about jobs, privacy, accuracy, ethics, and what might be lost as more of our work is automated.

These are important conversations.

But I am interested in another question.

As AI changes the way we work, how are we changing with it?

Because adapting to AI is not only a technology challenge. It is a human one.

For those of us running businesses or working independently, we can find ourselves in an unusual position. We are making choices about whether and how to use AI in our own work, while at the same time trying to predict and adapt to changes in our industries, clients, and markets that we have not chosen.

We are both trying to implement a change and responding to that change, all at once.

And how we do that comes in a variety of ways. Some organisations are embedding AI into everyday workflows. Some are tentatively exploring its possibilities, hedging against being left behind. Others are looking at how their clients might be using AI and how that might change their value proposition. Most are somewhere in between—experimenting, questioning, and working out where AI genuinely creates value. 

There is no single experience of this change.

And that makes this a particularly useful time to learn from each other.

What have others tried? What has genuinely helped? What has not? What has surprised them? What assumptions have been challenged? And what are they still trying to work out?

Peer experience is especially valuable when the answers are still emerging. We do not need everyone to be an expert or consult with experts whenever the situation evolves. Rather, we need opportunities to connect, compare, make sense of, explore, test, and otherwise learn from people facing similar questions.

We may not get to choose whether AI changes our profession, industry, or client expectations. But we still have choices in how we respond; we still have agency about what we do.

We can decide what we are curious enough to explore. We can question whether faster necessarily means better. We can notice when something useful is emerging and be willing to adapt. We can also recognise where efficiency is not the only thing that matters.

That leads to another question I think we need to keep asking:

As technology becomes more capable, where do we still need human judgement, care, discernment and responsibility?

Not because humans are necessarily better at everything, or because technology should be resisted, but because deciding what we hand over to technology is itself a human decision.

These questions sit naturally within the Inner Development Goals of Thinking and Acting.

Thinking asks us to approach complexity from different perspectives, critically assess information, and make sense of an uncertain and changing world.

Acting asks something different of us: the courage to engage with change, the creativity to experiment with new possibilities, and the willingness to move forward without needing to know exactly where everything will lead.

At October’s Business Women Australia Virtual Member Connect, we will use AI as the focus for exploring these questions together.

This will not be a technical masterclass or a session about becoming an AI expert. It will be a facilitated peer conversation for small business owners and independent professionals to explore how we are experiencing AI-driven change, make sense of what it means for our work, and consider where we still have agency to choose how we respond.

We will draw on the different experiences in the room, what people are trying, what is working, what feels difficult, what they are still uncertain about, and what they are learning along the way.

The aim is not to leave with all the answers.

It is to leave with greater clarity about the choices we can make, what we want to explore further, and one useful next step we are willing to take.

Because in a rapidly changing world, perhaps one of the most important capabilities we can develop is not the ability to predict what comes next – it’s the ability to navigate when what comes next is unknowable.

This is the thinking behind October’s Business Women Australia Monthly Virtual Member Connect –  Smart Systems, Tech & AI theme, which brings these questions into our Business Women Australia community and creates space to explore how we can navigate AI-driven change with greater awareness, agency and intention.

About Tanya Gawthorne

Tanya Gawthorne is a facilitator, strategic planning consultant, and founder of Balanced Consulting, an independent practice that creates conversations for clarity.

She works with individuals, teams, and organisations navigating complexity, change, and pressure — helping people make sense of challenges, align around what matters, and move forward with greater clarity, wisdom, and purpose.

Drawing on experience across health, environment, community, government, and not-for-profit sectors, Tanya combines strategic thinking, facilitation, coaching, and systems perspectives to support thoughtful decision-making and sustainable ways forward.

Her work spans strategic planning, stakeholder engagement, leadership development, rest and restoration, and reflective conversations about life, work, and change.

With qualifications in environmental science, public health, and applied epidemiology, Tanya brings an interdisciplinary perspective to every conversation — bridging human and environmental dimensions of individual, organisational, and community wellbeing.

Tanya Gawthorne will facilitate October’s Online Business Women Australia Monthly Virtual Member Connect: Smart Systems, Tech & AI, guiding a candid conversation on operational leverage, productivity, responsible AI adoption, and leading through rapid technological change. Join the discussion: https://events.humanitix.com/business-women-australia-monthly-virtual-member-connect-smart-systems-tech-and-ai

About Business Women Australia

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