Good morning, AI enthusiasts!
Right before the holiday slowdown, everyone is talking about how AI will help them move faster in 2026. Take the opposite view, and look at the uncomfortable truth that some teams get slower the more AI they use.
Plus, you'll discover why simplifying your AI setup might beat adding new tools, and how to walk into holiday conversations with a sharper, more contrarian take on AI productivity.
If you want an edge heading into the new year, or your family holiday party, this is the place to start.
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SLIPPERY SUPER POWER
Could AI be making you slower?
Most marketers think their AI problem is that they are not using enough tools.
The real problem is that many are using too many, in the wrong places, and with the wrong expectations.
This matters because productivity is no longer about speed. It is about clarity. And clarity disappears fast when AI becomes another layer of noise instead of a force that removes work.
Marketers learn this the hard way when considering how fast they could generate content with AI. Workflows look impressive on the surface. There are tools for drafting, tools for rewriting, tools for summarizing, and tools that claimed to organize everything.
But, what if the actual publishing rate stay flat? Is the team spending more time fixing AI output than creating anything useful?
The question should not be “How do I add AI?” but “What work disappears because of AI?”
If nothing disappears, nothing improves.
Many teams now push out piles of AI-written material. Emails. Drafts. Posts. Ideas. It all looks polished for about three seconds. Then someone reads it and has that sinking feeling you get when something sounds fine but says nothing.
This is workslop. It looks smooth. It reads clean. But it adds friction to the process because someone still has to think.
If you want AI to help, give it structure. Create the angle and message, then let AI shape the words around your thinking. Not the other way around.
Try a simple pattern like this:
Write your own outline.
Tell the model to follow it without guessing.
Edit with intent, not frustration.
This keeps you in control of the part that actually drives performance: the idea itself.
Not tool hopping. This is the quiet killer of productivity.
Every switch breaks your rhythm. Every “quick test” becomes another draft to review. Every new tool promises magic, then hands you a small pile of tasks you did not need.
A better move is to design a simple workflow with one or two tools. One main assistant for thinking and writing. One embedded tool where you work daily. That is enough for almost any marketing team.
If you want to test whether your setup is helping or hurting you, drop this into your AI assistant:
“Here is my weekly marketing workflow. Highlight places where AI adds noise or slows me down. Propose a simpler workflow using fewer tools. Show me what I can stop doing.”
Let the model audit your own usage. It is a strange, but useful, mirror.
AI will not make you faster by default. It will only make you faster if you remove steps, not add them.
Great marketers do not ask “What can AI create for me?” They ask “What can AI take off my plate so I can think more clearly?”
That is where the real leverage sits.
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