SponsoredHi Andy,
I don’t know why, but I recalled something from ArtCenter's BOLD conference from a few years back. During a panel discussion, the "last mile" problem in urban planning was brought up.Public transportation gets you most of the way there. Trains, buses, all of it. Then the system stops. That last stretch — the walk from the station to your final destination — is the reason a lot of people just take the car instead.
I haven't stopped thinking about it since. Because it's exactly what's happening with AI.
Somewhere along the way we started believing AI should do the whole journey for us. Idea in, masterpiece out. No friction. No fingerprints.
I've watched people — smart, capable, talented people — burn hours trying to get the machine to read their mind. Rewriting the same prompt fifteen ways. Waiting for the perfect output so they don't have to feel exposed by their own first draft.
I know that instinct. I'm a recovering graphic designer. Perfectionism is my mother tongue.
AI gets you 90%+ of the way there. The last mile — the beginning and the end — is still yours to walk.
You show up first. Rough. Unfiltered. Whatever's actually true, before it's been polished into something presentable. That's the part that shouldn’t be outsourced, because it's the part that's actually you. Your stories. Your lived experiences. Don’t outsource this to the machine.
Then let the machine do its job — structure, tightening, a second set of eyes. Not a replacement for your voice. A mirror that asks better questions than you were asking yourself. Sometimes, it’s annoying to be questioned, but then it makes me realize, I wasn’t clear or specific enough.
This is what Stanley has done for me. I write. No editing. Loose. It feels freeing.
Then, Stanley reshapes, questions, suggests. I do the final pass — the art direction, the last mile. I remove the AI-isms and add my Do-isms.
If part of your plan is showing up on LinkedIn more, more often, more like yourself — I think Stanley is worth fourteen days of your time.
Write the rough draft. Get help. Publish more consistently.
Get started on your fourteen day free trial.- c
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