Despite some advocating semantic inference stacking
and others prompt–response loop calibration,
I still find the most effective LLM guidance to be,
as my daughter’s preschool teacher would say,
USE YOUR WORDS.

There’s a key moment in Arrival
when the main character chooses not to fear the unknown,
but to engage with it — 
to go beyond natural defensiveness
and create a space for understanding.

In that moment,
her strength doesn’t come from posturing or demanding.
Or, dare I say it — prompting.
It comes from dialogue. From listening.
And responding. Asking. And answering.
Giving of herself in order to seek meaning.
And from that single shift, a new reality is born.

Welcome to the final installment.

Over the last four articles,
we’ve used movies to map the arc of this strange new relationship
between marketers and machines.
We started with Blade Runner and the illusions of understanding.
Then fell for Her and the romance of potential.
We panicked in 2001, only to realize HAL wasn’t the real threat.
And in Wall·E, we examined how optimization is making us soft
and how elevation should now be our goal.

So here we are. At article 5,
and the future isn’t just coming.
It’s here. It’s speaking.
And the question before us is therefore how do we respond?

You know by now that LLMs don’t think.
They don’t feel. And they sure as hell don’t lead.
That’s on us.

You also know that used wisely,
they can make strategy sharper.
Ideas stronger. Brand stories bolder.
And together we can make more.
Make better. Make faster.
And maybe even make work we’re proud of again.

But in truth, none of that will happen unless we act.

And just like in Arrival,
this change won’t occur on its own.
It will take us moving beyond our comfort zones.
Stepping into roles we have no experience with.
And diving into a future that demands we move,
think, speak, and lead differently.

The time for learning is never over.
But the time for only learning is.
So let’s talk about what to do next.

Let’s talk about what great teams will do now —
and what those still waiting will miss.

Right now,
a lot of marketers are clinging to what they remember.
The org charts they knew.
The workflows they mastered. The proven decks.
The accepted metrics. The tried and true.
But ask yourself:
while some of that data may still be accurate,
how much of it is still relevant?
The cost of content has collapsed.
The speed of production is near-instant.
And in a world like that, the metrics we used to rely on — 
volume, consistency, even reach —
offer no strategic advantage.

Everyone has reach.
Everyone has volume.
Everyone has polish.
So what should we be measuring now?
What happens when your team’s goal isn’t just to deliver more
but to move the conversation?
What happens when success stops being about what we make?
and starts being about who we move?

This is where we lead. And where we help others shift their lens:

• From performance marketing to perspective marketing
• From message testing to idea tension
• From “how many posts?” to what kind of impact?
• From share of voice to share of interpretation

Yes, you still need impressions.
But what matters now is the impression you leave.
So instead of asking: how fast did we ship?
Or how much did we publish?
We need to start asking:

• Did we say something no one else could have said?
• Did we reframe the problem in a way that moved the conversation?
• Did we uncover something others missed?
• And how do we start measuring those new high-water marks?

Because here’s the truth:
we don’t have perfect answers yet.
The metrics for resonance, originality,
emotional impact are still emerging.
And that’s okay.
The old scorecard wasn’t built in a day either.

But we do need to begin.
Because we’re not just playing a faster game now,
we’re playing a different one.
And in a world where LLMs have made sameness effortless,
our job is to make meaning measurable — 
and difference undeniable.

We’re not talking about a new toolset.
This is a new mindset.
So no, you can’t just teach your team to “use ChatGPT.”
This shift isn’t tactical.
It’s not “Try these 10 prompts” or
“Install that Chrome extension.”
It’s personal. Human.
Sometimes awkward. Often revealing.

Some people will struggle with clarity — 
not because they’re bad thinkers,
but because they’ve never had to externalize their thinking before.
They know what they mean. But the model doesn’t.
And now they’re forced to translate intuition
into steps. Into analogies.

Others will wrestle with control,
still treating the tool like a vending machine:
insert prompt, expect solution.
But this isn’t about getting to an answer.
It’s about staying open long enough to find a better one.
And the ones who struggle most aren’t the slowest,
they’re the fast ones. The finishers. The fixers.
The ones who’ve built careers on decisiveness
now having to sit in uncertainty. And play again.

Then there are those who just freeze,
not because they lack ideas,
but because they’re overwhelmed by the speed
and uncanny polish of it all.
They assume everyone else gets it.
That they’re behind.
And that pressure shuts things down before they even start.

And as if that wasn’t challenge enough,
the same model behaves differently with each user,
reflecting not just its training data but the users voice.
Their intent. Their style.
Every response becomes a mirror –
thrilling to some but disorienting to others.

Bottom line, this isn’t about handing out a universal playbook.
It’s about helping individuals build a relationship
with the tool that brings out their best.
Almost like matchmaking — someone to sit with the discomfort,
shape the first few conversations,
and make sure the potential doesn’t get lost in translation.

Because once they get past those initial fumbles,
progress can be exponential.
Not just faster. But sharper.
More expressive. More adaptive.
and hitting notes they didn’t know they had.
Unlocking not just efficiency,
but elevating their voice. Their thinking.
And their creative potential.
More layered. More alive. More them.

Once your team learns to think collaboratively with LLMs,
the next step is actually one that’s long overdue — 
re-centering your strategy.

The fractured and ever-changing media landscape of recent decades
has left us exhausted and un-centered,
chasing trends, over-testing, and optimizing everything —
until there was no there there anymore.

So in a strange way, the arrival of the LLMs
gives us a rare opportunity to pause.
To go back. And to reconnect with what matters -
the fundamentals: Positioning. Audience. Truth.

It’s actually a huge gift.
BUT only if someone is guiding the conversation.

That means having a creative strategist at the center.
Someone who can help you refine what your brand stands for.
Who your audience really is.
And how to connect the two.
Not just generating answers — 
but expanding your palette of questions.
What tension are we tapping into?
What belief are we trying to change?
What feeling do we want to leave people with?
Because all the speed and scale and, even brilliance,
won’t help if you’re adrift, unfocused, or worst of all,
going faster and faster in the wrong direction.

But what is the right direction?

Well, fortunately, AI can be every bit as much of a boon
to strategists as it is to creatives –
helping them do what they’ve always done — 
only better:
Finding clarity. Defining meaning.
Holding the line between creativity and chaos.
And in the best teams we work with,
going further — 
using LLMs to resurface half-forgotten truths.
Pressure-test brand narratives.
Raise expectations.

Because again, in a world where content is cheap,
volume, once a benchmark, is now noise.
And just saying something no longer counts.
It only matters if it means something.
Because what AI can’t,
what it won’t do,
is care.
That’s still our job.

We’ve finally got a machine that knows how to talk.
The task now is to find something worth saying.

We’ve come a long way.
From More Human Than Human to Beige is the New Black.
From awe to anxiety. From prompts to practice.
Along the way, we’ve asked big questions — 
about trust, about truth,
about what it means to do meaningful work
in a world where content is infinite, but attention isn’t.
And here’s where we’ve landed:

LLMs won’t replace you.
But they will raise the bar on your thinking,
your standards, your leadership.
And LLMs will still require you,
your voice, your values, and your vision.
Because as we’ve seen, the real threat isn’t the machine.
It’s what happens when we stop showing up.

So if you’re wondering where to go from here,
start with this: decide what kind of work you want to make now —
and who you want to become in the process.
Then, when you’re ready, let’s make it real.
Not with a full-time AI task force (you don’t need one).
But with a partner who sees what makes your brand distinct — 
and knows how to protect that edge in a world of effortless sameness.

That’s where my team and I can help:

• Strategic Sprint
  A 2-week deep dive to sharpen your POV,
  pressure-test your positioning,
  and align your message with the LLM era.
• Team Training Workshops
  Hands-on sessions to move your team from prompting to partnering — 
  using real briefs, real-time feedback, and your real voice.
• Fractional Chief Brand Strategist
  A 3–6 month engagement to train your trainers,
  evolve your story, and leave you with a scalable,
  AI-smart creative roadmap.

None of these is an endpoint
so much as a starting point to doing the real work
of helping your team stop treating AI like a shortcut
and start using it like a partner to produce more clarity.
Greater originality. And better results.
And the sooner we begin,
the sooner you can start saying something that matters.
Until then, onward.

This series wouldn’t exist without the insight, patience, and moral support of two people:

My beautiful wife, Cecile Engrand — the best event marketing CD I know — who was showing the world what was possible with AI long before the rest of us caught on, and whose strategic sensibility still grounds everything I do.

And my lifelong friend, Thomas Bolton — Princeton-trained, fractional CPO, and AI whisperer — who’s been my teacher, tech advisor, and intellectual sparring partner from day one. And the only person I know who’s building his own AlphaGo model … for fun.

Without their very human connection (and the help of my favorite LLM, ChatGPT), none of this would’ve come together.

All film references in this article are used under U.S. Fair Use Guidelines for the purpose of commentary, critique, and cultural analysis. All rights remain with the original copyright holders. If you’re a rights holder and wish to request attribution or removal, please contact me at LiamSherborn@gmail.com.