AI Mindset Course Revised and Re-launched

Welcome to the AI Applied Podcast guys we have a lot of exciting announcements coming down the pipe new podcasts were starting incredible guests were bringing on but the most exciting thing for me perhaps is actually something that Connor has just launched that he has been working on for a very long time so two things have happened number one Connor has officially left NYU Stern where he was the chief architect he was basically pivotal in bringing AI to NYU and and did so much education and

the space so that's really like a huge step we're going to talk about and number two Connor has launched a completely revised edition of the AI mindset course this is something that has famously been taken by a you know tens and tens of thousands maybe over 100,000 you can talk to the numbers people have taken this course for transformation and transforming their mindset inside of the organization we're going to get into all of this first Connor tell us about leaving NYU Stern and like and moving into kind of going full time on AI mindset and where you're at with that

yeah thanks thanks chain yeah it's been I mean jaden it's been a journey right which I've started like you've been kind of like behind the scenes on this so like we've been waiting to talk about this for a long time so obviously I've been talking to you about this for months uh yeah guys I've been at NYU Stern I got my MBA from there so all told I've been there 18 years hard to leave a place after like 80 but I love Stern so much right it's like it really is like family to me like I'm super passionate about it

uh with dean of students there for many years chive architect there for years

and it's a phenomenal place and so and yeah the reason to step away which is like super super clear like just

so I have a company AI mindset and we train like large enterprises on and small enterprises too but on sort

of a completely new behavioral based approach um which by the way have some really cool things actually I

just remember to share with you as well jaden but like just on the NYU front the great thing is NYU Stern

is an amazing hands uh with you know the new dean the new leadership all that kind of stuff like

they love AI and it really felt like okay like you know and jaden you and I have been talking and look

I'm gonna say this out loud into the microphone maybe immediately regret it but it's been about

three or four months as you know that I've been like I got a I got a step I can't do both I can't

do both I can't do both and so as soon as I sort of like was kind of like talking about like

their plan I'm like my conscience is like super clear on all this because I think Stern is phenomenal

I think they're doing a phenomenal job on all this but AI mindset's just like growing like crazy jaden

I'm absolutely thrilled about that like you know and we have this new course and we've you know

we train entire like giant 10,000 person companies like end to end I think I've I think I was

mentioning to you or put on LinkedIn like I've worked with you know leadership at four of the top

of the fortune 10 companies like I've done something where I've like this giant thing I do Google

isn't public yet so it's hard to say that one but it was essentially involved the entirety of

Google leadership which is tens of thousands of people the one that is and I can't speak too much

of this yet jaden but what we did make public was I worked with Microsoft we did we created a

research project for six months last year we were six months weekly on this research project

about could we work with an organization to sort of like get them using co-pilot so essentially

just you know another large language model better than what they were doing before in a very very

short amount of time and so we worked with GAP that's all public like that came out in November

Microsoft you know put out videos about it all that kind of stuff yeah saw the president and amazing

stuff and jaden I cannot the the results are still embargoed but who we they are good so

by the way I just want to say is massive because right now we're seeing both uh anthropic and

opening I make massive pushes on the enterprise front and the fact that you were able to see those

results with Microsoft and with their co-pilot I mean honestly you're you're kind of there's

secret weapon there so for other organizations and enterprises looking to adopt I mean I think

it's kind of it's kind of a secret weapon if people can get access to your course on this

opening I their they their approach is basically they just hired I don't know if you saw but like

all of the consulting firms like McKinsey and all of them and they're trying to they're doing

this massive push to use the consultants to get it inside of organizations and then thromic

at the same time they're doing their kind of software approach they also have I think a partnership

with a censure and service now and some other players but they're doing this huge push where they're

trying to build software specifically for enterprises to get it more embedded in there so everyone's

making the push but I think you're one of the first people that had you know this huge six-month-long

research project and from a research angle actually figuring out how to implement it like you

might have cracked the code before opening I and Anthropic because they're just hiring the consultants

to do it so and that's the funny thing Jayden and again I'm not really trying to do my own horn

although you know that I love to toot my own horn my god my wife Liz is just like honor enough

but you know microphones in front of my mouth what are you gonna do uh but yeah and we've worked

sort of like with McKinsey at scale we worked with you know Delay we work with a lot of companies

that AI mindset as well and here's the thing that so Jane when when I go out and you know like I'm

on the road just like all the time with just like tons of big companies and and yeah in this course

that we have it's gone out to tens of thousands of people in the end I think we've actually

calculated that we've trained something like almost like a quarter million people at this point

oh my gosh that's amazing but here's the crazy thing I'm going to tell everybody right now what

you need to do and then you won't need me okay the idea here is simply this people are treating AI

like a digital transformation when it acts nothing like a digital transformation that's it this is a

software that behaves like a human and yet and yet jaden everybody is treating this like they had

they they've done it with every other technology like oh well let's make sure that we have like you

know champions and here's the lighthouse cases and just make sure everybody has the tool and jaden we're

three years in it does not work so I'm just gonna give everybody my playbook right now I don't care

like because it's what I'm sure this is what we scrapped on AI applied podcast that's right value

so essentially what we do is we just tell people like guys like essentially the problem is not

about the tool and proficiency it is about the brain that is it this is a behavioral shift

it's not about that jaden we haven't done use cases in like two years we do process instead why

because use cases are all like moving from because you have to move from like encouraging people

like the fiverr memo and the Shopify memo hey guys come on find your use cases guys we're three

years in it doesn't work you have to get people to shift their behavior now that's that's sort of

our secret sauce like how do you get people to change behavior not just that you have to shift behavior

but how do you do it and I'll just tell you the way that we do it is to get people understanding

that what their brains are actually seeing when they're looking at something like a large language

model is they're actually looking at they think they're looking at a search engine and so they go

into this whole thing this whole mindset where it's like they use it like a search engine which is

command response walk away right that's how you use a search engine and you're bringing literally

because your brain works on visual cues it literally thinks it's looking at a search engine

that's why adoption is so low so we take people through these frameworks and then tell them how to

like rewire how they think and what they see and it just again Google doesn't need me to teach

them AI Microsoft doesn't need me to teach them AI these companies that I work with they don't need

NASA they don't need me to teach them AI what they need is sort of like how do we scale this up

and last thing I'll say Jane this just came out they might have seen this behavior this AI fluency

index from Anthropic that came out and just think about what they called it right they didn't

call it a set of proficiencies which you do with every other tech they called it a set of behaviors

it's what we've been saying for years Jane it's just about shifting behavior

so talk to me about like I think a lot of people maybe if they haven't already taken it or maybe

they've taken it but they haven't gotten everyone in the organization to take it which really is

I think where you you see the most value with your your course what are some of the biggest

changes that that you've added to the course like what are the like you've done this big launch and

you've changed all these things what are the biggest updates maybe if someone took it in the past

is it worth taking it again or if they've taken it in the past past and they want perhaps the

organization the full organization take it again like what's what's what's the new and improve

what's the latest in greatest yeah it's it's a good question because a lot of it I mean there's a

lot of fundamentals haven't changed because it's all about behavior it's not actually about the

latest tech however there are some big changes in 2026 that we are now incorporating and so we

have to have sort of like the mindset shift and all that kind of stuff that has to sort of like

be in there and we always sort of like make you know companies when they want to sort of like

customize or like okay this part has to be in it but Jayden you and I it's almost like if we

looked at the the sort of trajectory of our podcast over the last like what is it like two years

now or something like that doing this you remember how like we something will happen and then we

demo it we're like oh well did it work or did it not work so the biggest change I would say is

that a lot of these things now work so I always like yeah don't worry about the tech but now I'm like

hey guys you actually have to worry about the tech and the reason you have to worry about the tech

is because the tech is going to impact how you work it's no longer like hey check out this cool

you know project mariner demo from Google or something like in this course like we demo for

folks that are non-technical so maybe you guys are already flying on this and you don't need this

module but for people who are non-technical how does cloud code work actually work like what gets

you started on it AI studio like how do you actually like vibe code like stuff that will actually

be useful for you AI studio live like what does it look like to have kind of like a companion over

your shoulder notebook LM all these things that maybe people have sort of been like oh you know I made

like a podcast but a lot of people don't actually go to that site and actually do it and it's not

about making the podcast it's about changing your workflow cheating it is amazing you you go on

Gemini and you throw something into deep research and you all of a sudden you wait nine minutes and

you come out with something like extraordinary and then you go into notebook LM and then you have a

create infographics the slide decks that nano banana are extra that I couldn't do it even if you

gave me three weeks and all of a sudden you now have an end-to-end thing like we have guys and kind

of like pulling back the curtain maybe a little too far but we've changed the way that we work with

clients because like we now can create something for them that's totally bespoke to them

I think the biggest change is just all the stuff that we've seen in demo over the last call at 18

months are here now 100 percent no I I think I've seen this and I've talked to a lot of people

about this it feels like with chat GPT 5.2 and opus 4.6 basically those two models it's everyone's

like oh you know like you know 5.1 like chat GP5 everyone's like oh what's the big deal 5.1 what's

the big deal 5.2 like oh just a little incremental guys I'm telling you these two models and what

they unlocked and also I mean we're going to like what Google's doing and a lot of other companies

are doing to right now like we're all kind of in the same place in the industry unlocking the

ability to have basically like these swarms like these agent swarms where they have multiple

agents doing multiple parts of a task speeding things up it basically unlocked doing computer use

so being able to take over your computer screen and get things done and it unlocked like the

efficiencies and everything for vibe coding like I think we hit a point where it's I wouldn't be

in the past I'm like you've gone around been like oh you know this is where we're going in the

future don't worry this isn't perfect no guys like it is good like if you are not using it

for a huge chunk of your work you absolutely can now and if you tried something in the past and

it didn't quite work it probably works today like the demos and the things we were excited for

a year ago and a year and a half ago are finally actually realizing it definitely drives me crazy

it drives me nuts that like we saw these demos back then and a lot of people tried them and I think

they got jaded because they're like oh like it doesn't work guys it works today and if nothing

else I would say be happy that you saw it or tried it back then because at least your mind was in

the right frame of like K what is gonna be possible and I think a lot of that is now possible today

so I'm pretty excited all right it's so right it's so right Jayden and the and that that

everything that we do in this course is stuff that I actually use and it's and Jayden to your

point like I kind of wasn't using some of these things as I'm like uh but guys if you don't if

you're not using Gemini like when you're in chrome or if you're not using the the clawed extension

in chrome or guys just go to AI studio live just a little Google AI studio live and what you will

see is something there that you can share your screen with and then it just it's like you have a

companion looking over your shoulder I'm in there with like Capcom like wait what do I press

like do you see like the templates button up there I'm like you mean over here yeah yeah over there

now kind of click that okay I clicked it okay now you see that Jayden it's miraculous borderline

miraculous so I think the biggest change that we've seen and that's why we wanted to redo this course

in 2026 like this is first of all the fundamentals like we get people actually shifting how they work

and that's critical that's why we were able to do it at scale but also to your point these if you

have not tried these tools of late or if you tried it and it didn't really work and then you're like

oh you kind of forget about it go revisit it because these things that we're talking about Jayden and

I actually are using every day and we're not like we're not sort of like the cutting edge developer

kind of people we are just people using this Jayden's building AI box I build AI mindset and we're

using these tools to actually build our own companies yeah 100% so anyways if you haven't

tried it already guys there's a link in the description the latest update to the mindset course

you absolutely have to get that and if you've already done it and your organization hasn't

do not leave you know money on the table make sure that everybody is in your organization

is is taking that course because it will absolutely transform what you're doing and honestly

you'll probably get a raise for recommending it to your organization so I can't guarantee that

right that that's not a guarantee of the course but it is likely okay so make sure go check it out

there's a link in the description a Connor congratulations for the the new step stepping in

full-time on AI mindset and and the launch of the new course a lot of people are

raving about it so excited to see the new direction everyone thanks so much for tuning to the

podcast make sure to leave a rating and review wherever you get your episode and we will catch you

in the next in the next show in the next