Staying Relevant When AI Moves Faster Than You

Irrelevance is like carbon monoxide – odorless, colorless, and potentially fatal to your career. You don’t see it coming until you’re already gasping for air.

That is our innate human fear and AI triggers it.

“Am I relevant right now?” “Is what I’m doing impactful?”

The fact is, it doesn’t matter how you answer—because in five years, we are all going to be irrelevant unless we do something about it now.

Think about it:

-Blockbuster, once the king of Friday nights, is gone thanks to Netflix.

-Kodak was once the king of film, and thanks to digital cameras and smartphones, no longer.

-Taxi companies ruled transportation, and thanks to Uber, no longer.

These weren’t business failures. These were failures of people who did not recognize that they needed to pivot to stay relevant. So how do we navigate a world changing faster than our brains can process? The adaptability muscle.

My career has been defined by pivots –

-From professional rugby player (yes, at 5 ‘3″) to data engineer.

-From business analyst to C-suite executive across multiple Fortune 100s, to author and patent-holder.

Each transition taught me that staying relevant isn’t a destination; it’s a continuous practice. So, here are five practices that will empower you to stay relevant in a world changing faster than we can comprehend:

1. Say Yes and Lean In (With Focus)

When Watson beat Ken Jennings at Jeopardy in 2011, I knew I had to be part of that revolution.

For 4 months straight, I gracefully (but persistently) asked my way into IBM’s Watson team when everyone wanted in. That single “yes” fundamentally altered my career trajectory.

But here’s what most people miss: saying “yes” is worthless without maniacal focus.

I’ve watched countless professionals dilute their impact by half-baking nine different interests simultaneously.

Think of focus like a magnifying glass in the sun – scattered light merely warms, but concentrated light ignites fire.

Pick one thing, go deep, and create heat.

2. Get Comfortable Being Bored

Last year, I conducted a personal experiment: no phone while waiting in line for coffee.

Sounds trivial, right? It wasn’t.

Breaking that seemingly innocent habit took three months. The first few weeks felt like withdrawal – that anxious itch to reach for my phone was almost physical.

But by month four, something remarkable happened: during one of those “bored” moments, my conscious and subconscious minds collided and birthed my 11th patent.

The space between stimulus and response is where innovation lives. Most of us have collapsed that space to zero.

3. Be a True Student

Did you know the shelf life of a professional skill is now just five years?

Let that sink in. The specialized knowledge you proudly acquire today will be obsolete before your car loan is paid off.

But there’s a profound difference between being a consumer of information and being a student. Watching short videos while multitasking isn’t learning – it’s intellectual fast food: momentarily satisfying but nutritionally bankrupt.

True students don’t just receive information – they retain and reflect on it. They process rather than just consume.

The ones who succeed aren’t those with more information; they’re the ones who create connect the dots in a way that hasn’t been done before.

4. Use Technology, Don’t Let It Use You

I now deliberately run without headphones – no podcasts, no music, no distractions.

The first 5 minutes are excruciating. Pure boredom. Then it gets worse – my mind floods with mental chatter, like I’m hosting a party in my head.

But push through that phase, and something magical emerges: a crystal clarity that’s impossible to achieve when constantly consuming.

During one of these “empty” runs, I spontaneously developed an entire leadership off-site agenda that my team still references years later as their best strategic session ever.

The most powerful technology is the one you can turn off.

Your competitive advantage in an AI-saturated world isn’t your ability to consume information faster – it’s your ability to think independently of it.

5. Prioritize Connections, Not Just Contacts

We live in an era where we can “connect” with thousands of people with a click.

But here’s an uncomfortable truth: Your digital rolodex of 10,000 LinkedIn contacts isn’t worth a single genuine relationship.

That promotion you landed? That wasn’t your impressive contact list – it was someone’s belief in your character.
That deal you closed? That wasn’t your pitch deck – it was the trust you established.
That big break that changed everything? That was someone investing in you as a human.

When I inherited my largest team – 832 people spread across the globe – I spent five months meeting each person individually.

I discovered that at its core, leadership isn’t about managing skills or strategy. It’s about cultivating hope.

The Ultimate Practice: Deliberate Rest

The average American consumes 74 gigabytes of information daily – equivalent to watching 16 full-length movies. Every. Single. Day.

It’s mental overload by design. We weren’t built for this.

If there’s one practice to master above all others, it’s this: deliberate rest.

Not the “rest” where you collapse on the couch scrolling through social media.

I mean true cognitive whitespace – the intentional practice of being idle long enough for your mind to integrate what it’s absorbed.

The post-AI world won’t belong to those who can consume the most information.

It will belong to those who can make the most meaning out of the right information.

I’d love to know: Which of these five practices resonates most with you? What’s one small step you’ll take today toward staying relevant?

Reply and share your thoughts.

Until next Friday,

Sol

PS: I dive deeper into these principles in my TEDx talk, “How to Avoid Being Irrelevant.” Give it a watch for fresh, practical insights on staying relevant in the fast-paced world of AI.

Every Friday morning, I deliver 1 actionable insight to help you navigate the post-AI landscape, simplifying complex transitions into a clear path for business impact. You can click here to subscribe.