Between You and AI: The human skills that will save leadership (and your sanity)

CULTURE & CODE

By Joey Briones

AI is moving fast.
Leaders are confused.
Employees are anxious.

And somewhere in the middle of this chaos sits the real battle of our time: What happens in the space between you and AI?

Influencer, speaker, podcast host, and now author Andrea Iorio’s new book Between You and AI (just released last November 10) makes a beautifully uncomfortable point:

Your biggest risk isn’t that AI will replace you. It’s that your human skills won’t keep up.

Powerful.
A little painful.
Yet absolutely true.

Because here’s the secret nobody tells you:

AI isn’t here to take your job.
AI is here to expose how good you really are at it.

And that’s where the story gets interesting.

AI won’t replace leaders. But it will replace bad ones.

Let’s admit something – AI is better than humans at a lot of things:

• speed
• analysis
• forecasting
• summarizing
• never forgetting where it saved a file

If your leadership style is basically “forward emails and hope for the best,”
sorry to say – AI is coming for you.

But Iorio flips the script:

Human skills are not dying — they are becoming premium.

Why?

Because AI can generate answers, but only humans can generate sense.

AI can draft a message, but only humans can create meaning.

AI can do your report, but only you can lead a teamthrough uncertainty.

In other words: AI removes your excuses, not your responsibilities.

The 9 Hybrid Skills Every Leader Needs (Yes, All Nine)

Iorio outlines nine meta-skills.

Here’s the Culture and Code translation:

1. Prompting: Because AI Can’t Read Your Mind (Yet)

Clear thinking → clear requests → better output.
If you can’t articulate what you want, AI becomes useless.
Just like your team.

2. Data Sensemaking: Not All Graphs Tell the Truth

Data is everywhere.
Wisdom is not.
Leaders must know what to trust, what to ignore, and what to challenge.

3. Re–perception: Seeing the Same Thing, Differently

The superpower of saying: “Maybe we’re wrong.”
And actually meaning it.

4. Augmentation: Humans + AI = The New Superteam

You don’t compete with AI.
You collaborate.
Think Iron Man, not Terminator.

5. Adaptability: Reinvent Yourself Before Someone Else Does

Your job will change.
Your skills must change with it.
Adaptability is the new job security.

6. Antifragility: Get Stronger When Things Break

The world is chaotic.
AI will make it more so.
Leaders must grow under pressure — not snap like a poorly assembled IKEA chair.

7. Empathy: The One Skill AI Can’t Fake (Convincingly)

Empathy is the leadership cheat code.
It builds trust, drives performance, and protects culture.

8. Trust: The Hardest Currency to Earn in an AI World

Employees must trust leaders.
Leaders must trust teams.
Everyone must trust the system.
And the system needs guardrails.

9. Agency: Don’t Wait for Permission to Evolve

The worst leadership style in an AI age: Passive.
The best: Decide, act, learn, improve.
Repeat until excellent.

Human × AI = The New Operating System

This is Iorio’s big idea:

AI doesn’t make humans weaker.
AI makes weak human skills impossible to hide.

If you’re unclear? AI highlights it.
If you’re indecisive? AI exposes it.
If you’re not learning? AI outruns you.
If you’re disconnected? AI cannot save you.

AI raises the floor of performance —​ but leaders must raise the ceiling.

And that ceiling is built on:

• judgment
• emotional maturity
• communication
• moral reasoning
• meaning-making
• courage
• humanity

The skills AI cannot automate.

Culture Is Now an AI Strategy

This is where the conversation gets real:

Organizations won’t fail because of technology.
They will fail because of culture.

Your culture must support:

• experimentation
• learning agility
• psychological safety
• constructive challenge
• transparent decision-making
• human-centered leadership

Otherwise, AI becomes just another expensive tool used poorly by people who are secretly terrified of it.

AI accelerates your culture — for better or worse.

The Final Question (The One Leaders Must Answer)

Iorio ends with a question that leaders cannot ignore:

“What will you become now that AI is here?”

Not what will your job become.
Not what will your industry become.
Not what will AI become.

What will you become?

More adaptable?
More curious?
More courageous?
More human?

Because the future is not AI-powered.

It is human-powered, AI-accelerated.

And the leaders who win will be those who learn to lead in the space between you and AI —
the space where humanity is not lost,
but finally rediscovered.