During this year’s budget planning, I made a significant change: I cut the traditional contingency fund for external training design. Thanks to the rapid advancement of generative AI, the cost and time required to produce course materials, facilitator guides, and assessments have plummeted. It is now possible to generate a comprehensive curriculum in mere minutes, a feat that once required expensive consultants and weeks of labor. While this efficiency is a major win for organizational productivity, it has led me to wonder if we are confusing the speed of information delivery with the actual efficacy of learning.

However, we must remember that true learning goes far beyond the transfer of data; it is an inherently human experience. Exceptional trainers succeed because of their emotional intelligence, their ability to read a room, and their capacity to foster psychological safety—skills that AI simply cannot replicate. Effective training relies on storytelling, vulnerability, and the building of authentic rapport, turning abstract concepts into real-world behavioral changes. While AI is a powerful tool for streamlining the creation of knowledge, it cannot replace the inspiration and human connection that make a training session truly transformative. The future of professional development lies not in choosing between machines and people, but in using AI to handle the logistics while preserving the irreplaceable human elements that turn information into understanding.