Leadership, AI and the Future of Work with Dean Curtis | Ingaged Podcast

Ingage's rapid innovation has been customer-driven — building 'cool stuff' is far less meaningful than putting the customer at the heart of everything (Price Kit, Profile Builder, revamped onboarding).

Grow and invest in your people alongside the business — Dean wants everyone who leaves Ingage to consider it their new standard, and 'if you invest in them and they leave' costs less than 'if you don't and they stay' (a job post drew 300+ applicants in two days).

'Stay interviews' beat relying only on exit interviews — Dean asked all 40 staff two questions (three things you like, one you'd change), then used AI to turn the transcripts into a clear action plan; a top finding was how much the team values being genuinely distributed.

Fight tool fatigue but adopt the tools that create real impact — Fellow for meeting agendas, recording, and AI recaps pushed to the CRM, and Notion as a personal 'second brain.'

You don't rise to the occasion, you fall to the level of your systems — build systems that drive accountability and help you keep the commitments you make to yourself.

AI is an enabler, not a replacement — speech-analytics tools make a sales manager 'superhuman' at coaching; use AI to gain efficiency (like first-draft emails), and always keep a human layer to personalize and 'trust but verify' before anything goes out.

The overhyped-yet-essential trend is AI (it won't put on a roof, but ignore it at your peril); the trend that matters most is people — build the people and let the people build the business.