Episode 371: Will AI Replace Health Coaches? Why the Future Needs Human Practitioners
Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Spotify
Is AI coming for your job? Erin tackles this pressing question head-on in a thought-provoking episode designed to help you navigate the rise of AI with clarity and confidence. Instead of reacting from fear, you'll learn how to lean into what makes your work truly irreplaceable (like your presence, intuition, clinical insight, and the ability to facilitate real transformation!)
Erin breaks down how buyer behavior has evolved, why information alone no longer sells, and what this means for those building programs, writing content, or delivering client services. Surface-level strategies just won’t cut it anymore.
Whether you’re just starting your practice or leading a growing team, this episode will re-ground you in the skills and mindset needed to thrive and stand out in an increasingly noisy and AI-influenced space.
In this episode:
How consumer behavior has shifted toward craving transformation over info-packed courses
The 4 essential focus areas you must make to futureproof your business and stay relevant in the age of AI
How overreliance on AI can damage the reputation of functional medicine if misused for lab analysis and protocols
Erin’s tips and tricks on designing experiences that are rooted in your own voice, values, and client success stories
Why presence, intuition, and clinical mentorship are irreplaceable in delivering care that changes lives
Resources mentioned:
Join Erin’s Masterclass on August 14th for just $77! How to Turn 1:1 Client Wins into a Scalable Group Program
Applications are now open for the fall 2025 cohort of Funk’tional Nutrition Academy.
Organifi supplement powder (save 20% on your order with code FUNK)
LMNT Electrolyte Replenishing powder (Use code FUNK and get a free sample pack with any purchase!)
OneSkin (Use code FUNK for 15% off your first purchase)
Qualia Senolytic (get up to 50% off and an extra 15% off your first purchase with link + code FUNKS)
Bon Charge (Use code FUNK to save 15%)
-
This industry, healthcare, functional medicine, functional nutrition, alternative health, wellness, it's not going anywhere. And just because your algorithm or your feed seems saturated, it doesn't mean that the market is. You might be 5, 10, 15 years into your health journey, but you gotta remember some people are just waking up to theirs right now and they are actively, right now, in real time, seeking out support. I am of the attitude and the mindset that we need more skilled practitioners, not less. So this isn't the time to hang up your hat. This is the time to double the fuck down.
Welcome to the Funk'tional Nutrition podcast, spelled with a K, because we do things a little differently around here. I'm your host, Erin Holt, and I've got 15 years of clinical experience as a functional nutritionist and mindset coach, creating a new model that I call Intuitive Functional Medicine™️ where we combine root cause medicine with the innate intelligence of your body. This is where science meets self trust. Your body already knows how to heal in this show is going to show you how. If you're looking for new ways of thinking about your health, be sure to follow and share with a friend because you never know whose life you might change.
Hello, my friends. Today I've got sort of a different episode for you today. I'm even recording it in a different place. I'm not in my office. I am in my bedroom, in my lake house, recording to you, talking to you from my bed. So if the audio is a little different, that's why I actually referenced this topic just last week on last week's show. And when I did that, I had no intention of recording a whole ass podcast about it for today.
But a lot of different things happened and I had a lot of conversations which kind of led me to this podcast which is addressing the question, will AI replace functional practitioners? So this show is definitely geared more toward by business owners, by practitioners. As always, there's gems in here for everyone. But if you're like currently searching how to heal my gut, this probably isn't the show for you. So come back to next week because we actually will be talking about how to heal your gut then. But today, today is more of a peek behind the curtain. These are conversations that I'm having with my colleagues, with my mentors, conversations I'm having with my team, how I am leading my team, or at least attempting to lead my team in the age of AI. We're going to be talking about this a lot more in fna, the Funk'tional Nutrition Academy, my practitioner training program, because it feels a little foolish to ignore the elephant in the room right now. It's here, it's happening.
And so what does that mean for our industry? What does that mean for practitioners? AI isn't going anywhere. So we want to leverage it for the tool that it can be without allowing it to render us obsolete. And I encourage you, especially for today's show, if you have practitioner friends, definitely send them this episode. Even if people aren't vocalizing this worry out loud. It is for sure on a lot of practitioners minds. And my hope with recording this episode is that I give you real strategies to navigate these waters. And by the end of this episode, I want you to feel like you're in a place of empowerment versus reactivity and fear. What's kind of funny is when I first had the idea to record this podcast, this particular topic, I thought it would be like a 20 minute banger, like a quickie.
But then I sat down and I got to writing it. And by the way, I do write all of my own podcasts myself. I do not use AI for that. It turns out I had a lot more to say than 20 minutes. So funnily enough, this is going to probably end up being the longest episode I've recorded and released in a while. But I figure if we're going to talk about it, then let's really dig in and have this conversation. Okay, so quick high level overview. Today we're going to talk about:
One, how the market, including buying behavior, has changed and what you should be aware of if you do run your own practice.
Two, who will most likely be the most successful moving forward because you want to position yourself, you want to put yourself in that category.
Three, specifically what AI can replace and what it cannot replace.
Now, I'm not going to get into specific AI tools and how to leverage them in your practice. That's a lot of what we're starting to talk about within fna. I do think that there are some really great things we can do with AI. But today I will share where I absolutely will not touch AI in my practice and why. And then finally we will close out with four crucial things to really focus on if you want to be around for the next five years.
So the idea for this episode came from the fact that next week I'm teaching a masterclass called "How to Turn 1:1 Client Wins Into a Scalable Group Program", where to start, what to teach, and how to fill it. It's only $77. I'm super excited about it. It's going to be packed full with goodness and I'm going to show you how to design a results driven group offer using the clinical tools and the client wins that you already have without having to compromise your integrity or client connection. So it's going to be awesome. And you can get your ticket using the link in the show notes. But I've been working on that masterclass for the past few weeks and I realized that I was weaving some of this AI conversation into the workshop a little bit. Because if we' about creating a group program, we also have to talk about the fact that you can prompt AI to create a program outline for you.
You can even have ChatGPT build out a whole ass program for you. And there are people that are legitimately using it this way. So it sort of begs the question, why put in all the hard work when you can just easily take the shortcut? And that's kind of what today's episode is going to get into and attempt to answer. So, out of curiosity, a little bit meta experiment, if you will, I actually asked AI to create an outline for the workshop itself. So, like, come up with exactly what I should teach. The talking points, all of that jazz. And I worked with it because AI is really only as good as the prompts that you feed it, that you give it. And what it pumped out was something I was so underwhelmed with.
It just felt really surface level. It felt very vanilla. It felt like a lot of fluff. It was just like, meh. As a consumer, when I was reading through this, I was like, I wouldn't want to pay for this workshop. This is just like bare bones, basic fluff and stuff. There's no heartbeat to this. And so obviously that's not what I use to build the workshop, but it was just a cool experiment to show me that my mind, my heart, and my lived experience can do things and create things that AI cannot.
And I really want you to understand that for yourself too, which is going to be an omnipresent theme of today's show. So let's talk about how the market has changed. And I know that that can feel really confusing, that can feel overwhelming, it can feel really scary. And it certainly has potential to be all of that. But what I will tell you, part of the beauty and the benefit of being in business for 15 years is that I have seen the market shift a lot. I've seen trends come, I've seen them go. I've had to pivot my own practice and my own way of doing things kind of a lot. So now it feels less intimidating than it Used to.
It's kind of just like, well, that's showbiz, baby. So I want to offer that perspective in case you're new here and you're like, what is going on? What the helly? You're looking around and you're like, things feel different. They sure are. But that's truly, that's showbiz, babe. That's business. So things are always going to feel a little different. Things are always shifting and changing and rearranging. And it's really up to you how you navigate those changes.
So let's talk specifically how the market has changed. The first thing is that there are a lot more people competing for our attention. And when I say our attention, I'm talking about us as the consumers here. So there's a lot more people competing for consumers attention. Your attention is a commodity now. It is valuable. People are paying for your attention. Attention.
Your attention is your currency. So this is happening where there are more online businesses coming into the marketplace competing for attention. And at the same time something else is happening. Our attention span is decreasing. Our ability to direct and sustain attention is dwindling. And that's really due to our technology use. And by the way, AI is not going to make this any better. So anyway, there's more voices competing for our attention and our attention is decreasing at the same time, which means online businesses, content creators, have to do more to get their customers attention.
So what this ends up looking like is catchier hooks, borderline inflammatory posts, things that really stop you in your tracks as a way to grab your attention. Saying the things that will get people's attention rather than the things that can actually help them in some situations. Because again, attention is the biggest currency right now. So this has the collective experience of buyers, consumers, feeling like it's all kind of bleeding together. And I'm sure you've noticed this too. Nothing really stands out. It's all just kind of like noise. That always makes me think of the line in Juno when Jason Bateman's character kind of reveals himself to be a little bit of a douchebag.
And she looks at him and she says, I bought another Sonic Youth album and it sucks. It's just noise.
I don't know if your brain works.
In movie quotes, but mine sure as shit does. Anyway, all of what I just said has led to number two, which is buying behavior has changed. So the market itself has changed and then buying behavior has changed. Buyers, consumers, customer, clients, whatever you want to call them, they are way more savvy. They've been around the block. This online selling thing isn't new anymore. It's not novel. They're more savvy.
They're more discerning with their purchases. They're asking more questions. And they're starting to ask the right questions, too. Buyers want to know, can you actually help me? Like, this all looks good, but can you actually help me? Do you actually understand me and my struggles? Are you legit? How do I know that this will work before I buy it? How do I know that this will work? How is this different than the last thing I tried? So because of this, consumers or customers are a lot less impulsive with their purchases than they were even a few short years ago. And I even noticed this in myself, in my own buying behavior. I'm not as sucked into savvy marketing. I really want to. Am I going to benefit from this? Is this going to be worth not just my money, but my time? So you can't be selling and marketing using 2021 strategies to 2025 buyers.
It's just not going to work. And I say that to you in case you've been wondering, like, wtf is going on? If you're like, the stuff that used to work no longer does. You're totally right. You're absolutely right. And it's not because you're failing, and it's not because you suck. It's because the market has shifted. It's almost like there's an industry correction happening for online businesses right now, and we're definitely seeing this extend into the wellness world with practices and practitioners. So does this mean you're doomed? Absolutely not.
In fact, I will share something, a little piece of information with you. This July 2025, our company has had three times the clients we enrolled three times the clients this July 2025 than we did last July of 2024. So I don't tell you that to flex on myself or flex on my team or brag more. So to give you an anchor point, my mind does really well with expanders. I don't want to just hear about the doom and gloom. I want to hear evidence of what's possible. I need to hear people doing really well so I can hook into that and show my that's possible, too. So I'm telling you all of this because I want to set you up for success moving forward, not because I want you to run into a corner and cry about how everything is terrible.
Okay? But you do need to be really mindful of what will be successful moving forward. That way, you don't have to feel worried. You get to feel empowered and equipped with a plan. So what will be successful moving forward? And by the way, this isn't just coming from my brain or my opinion or my crystal ball. This is kind of a situation of. I've done the research so you don't have to. This is coming from a lot of different places and spaces, a lot of different experts, business experts, branding experts. I've talked to a lot of colleagues and peers and also had countless conversations and meetings with my team.
And there's one big prediction of what will be the most successful moving forward, and that is actual skill. Actual depth. Natalie Ella said, depth of skill is the new edge. Depth of skill is the new edge. You have to actually be good at what you do. Not just surface level stuff. Not just good at marketing, not just good at content creation, not just good at getting people's attention, but also the ability to go deeper than that. A deep understanding of who your customer is, what their needs are, who is your client base.
You need to understand what they're going through. You have to understand what they're experiencing, you have to understand why, and you have to know how to help. So if you are a practitioner who has built real skills and has been able to generate real results for your clients, this is great news for you in this new era. This is a real opportunity for really skilled practitioners. And if you don't feel that you have the skill set required yet, this is a really good time to invest in that. You guys, this industry, healthcare, functional medicine, functional nutrition, alternative health, wellness, it's not going anywhere. And just because your algorithm or your feed seems saturated, it doesn't mean that the market is. You might be 5, 10, 15 years into your health journey, but you gotta remember some people are just waking up to theirs right now and they are actively, right now, in real time, seeking out support.
I am of the attitude in the mindset that we need more skilled practitioners, not less. So this isn't the time to hang up your hat. This is the time to double the fuck down moving forward. Your offerings, your services, your programs need to be rooted in real experience, real results and real transformation. To run a successful practice, you do have to be good at marketing. That's not just going to go away, but you also have to be good at what you're selling. The good news is that FNA helps you do both. So let me just tell you about FNA.
Pitch my own wares for a hot minute, if you will. The Funk'tional Nutrition Academy is a 14 month mentorship and training for practitioners who want to think critically, apply functional medicine labs with confidence and build a results driven business that doesn't burn you out. You'll learn how to create context based protocols through a human centered lens, confidently interpret complex labs, get high touch mentorship and strategic support to grow. So again we are talking about clinical skills, but we are also supporting you from a business and marketing perspective too because both are really crucial. This is real mentorship for real practitioners ready to lead with both skill and integrity. Applications are officially open for fall cohort so we'll link up the application in the show notes. We do keep keep cohort sizes limited and we've already received more applications than we have spots for so definitely get your application is we're going to be opening up Discovery Call soon. I am so excited and I would love to have you join us.
Okay podcast buddies, I want to take a sec to shadow Organifi Green Apple Juice Yum. It's like a healthy apple juice with all the benefits of the original green juice. If you don't love the taste of the original green juice, this one is for you. It's made with organic apples that are hand picked Golden Delicious, Northern Spy, Macintosh, Ida, Red and Empire. So real deal apples are up in this blend. It also has the added benefit of 600 mg of ashwagandha, which is an adaptogen that helps the body cope with stress and can balance out cortisol levels. It also has really potent and nourishing green plants like moringa, spirulina and chlorella. It's so good, you're gonna absolutely love it. Order it today. Head to organifi.com/funk. O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I.com/FUNK and you can save 20% off your order with the code FUNK.
If you struggle with fatigue, headaches, muscle cramps, you might not be getting enough sodium. This might surprise you, but if you eat a primarily whole foods diet, it shouldn't. According to the FDA, 70 of sodium in the American diet processed foods. So if you reduce or eliminate processed foods from your diet strong recommend you may also be reducing essential sodium. Yes, sodium is essential. It's not an optional mineral. Since I eat a whole foods diet, I heavily salt my foods with sea salt. I also drink LMNT, a tasty and salty electrolyte mix daily. Right now LMNT is offering my listeners a free sample pack with any drink mix purchase. That's eight single serving packets for free with any drink mix purchase. It's a great way to try all the different flavors and you can get yours at drinkLMNT.com/Funk this deal is only available through this link so you have to go to D-R-I-N-K-L-M-N-T.com/FUNK. LMNT offers a no questions asked refunds so you can try it totally risk free.
Let's talk sunscreen it is the question you guys always ask me about in my current fave is hands down one skins SPF 30 plus. It's formulated with non nano zinc oxide and it goes on really well. No pasty face. I personally love the OS 1 tinted face SPF. I like to wear it instead of makeup during the summer. Now most SPFs just block UV rays, but these do more. They neutralize free radicals four times better than other anti aging SPFs. And the OS1 peptide is scientifically proven to prevent the accumulation of dysfunctional cells that cause your skin to age faster. So you're basically blocking UV while rejuvenating your skin at the cellular level. Make sure your skin is ready for summer with one skin scientifically proven SPFs. Visit OneSkin Co Funk for your first purchase. That is OneSkin.Co/Funk
Let's transition more into the AI side of things. Specifically what AI can replace and what it cannot replace. Ready for it. Number one, it can replace information. It can, it will and it has. So if you're creating offers or programs that are only information based that now holds less value because people can access information anywhere and they can get it for free. They're not purchasing information based products in the same way that they used to. And I want to be really clear.
This is not because the economy is down or because this industry is dead. It's because the value of information has changed. Social media, podcasts, chatgpt. We have so much more access to information than we used to. It's no longer a commodity that it used to be. I think back to 10, 15 years ago and how hard we had to work to access alternative health information. Now it's just out there. So your customers, your clients aren't paying you for information that they can get out there for free.
So what are they paying you for? They are hiring and paying you for results, for outcomes, for unique insight into their unique situation. They're paying for clarity. They're paying for guidance to be led on a path. Right now everyone is inundated with options. They want to know what is the right one. For me, information is everywhere. But what's actually going to get me the transformation. Transformation is Basically moving someone from a before state to a desired after state.
This is what people are investing in, not the information itself. So this is one of the ways that AI has really leveled the playing field. But we also know that information alone, alone doesn't beget transformation. So that's where you come in. And that's where AI cannot. That's where you, the practitioner, shines. And this is what AI cannot do. We just had a client reach out saying, I don't know where to turn anymore, without consulting the experts.
That's you. All because of all the chaos. Is it hormones? Is it perimenopause? Is it ibs? Do I need to go low? Fodmap? Is it something else? So this is where people are at. They've collected a shit ton of information, but they're like, but how does it apply to me? In fna, I refer to this as the IT factor framework. Information plus integration equals transformation. So we need to integrate information into strategies to get transformation. And that is what us as practitioners do in this integration. It's a process.
And it's a process that you, a human, walk another human through. I was recently having this conversation with an FNA grad, Kara Becker, who is a functional medicine health coach. And she said, I think a major irreplaceable piece is that often people don't even know what to ask AI. And whatever they do ask, then AI steers them in that one direction. A practitioner can instead see the bigger picture and connect the puzzle pieces to be able to say, okay, you asked AI that, but have you ever thought to ask AI this? That'll take them down a whole different path. So maybe AI is useful in a sense, but I think the ability to see the big complete picture in the intuitive hits practitioners get is the functional medicine magic. Also, I don't see how AI can ever be the true support partner that a real human provides to encourage real, lasting change, which I totally, totally agree. So let's keep talking about what AI won't replace.
It won't replace insight from clinical experience, patterns that you've seen in many clients. That is what gives practitioners the insight to do what Kara just mentioned. Hey, you're thinking about it this way. What if you think about it this way now, if you are a new practitioner listening to this and panicking, do not despair. I think this is where newer practitioners can get really stuck in a hamster wheel of inaction. Well, I don't have the experience and the results yet, so I can't really take forward momentum. And then they just feel stuck. But this is where I always encourage folks to lean into mentorship.
That is the number one thing that will accelerate your growth as a clinician and the type of growth that matters. Not just growth on social media, not just optics, growth that is built on a house of cards, but real growth as a clinician. Real growth in your clinical skill, your expertise and your confidence as a clinician. So this is why we bake so much mentorship into fna. Another thing that AI cannot replace is human experience and interaction. People want to be seen, they want to be heard. They are craving that right now. This is not something that AI can replicate.
I always tell my practitioners and my mentees, your power is in your presence. I recently had to go to the doctor, just a gp because I had this like allergic eye thing that was happening. And I won't bore you with the whole, whole story, but I was so impressed with the doctor that sat down in front of me. Why? Because he gave me his presence. He was fully there. I always tell my practitioners, be where your feet are, be where your feet land, be wholly present. And he offered me that. He sat right in front of me, he held my eye contact, he engaged in conversation.
And I was just so, so moved by the experience because that is not something that we see in healthcare, in wellness, in medicine much anymore. So presence is a humongous gift, the ability to hold space, to offer heart coherence to somebody else. That is something AI cannot do. I remember a mentor of mine, Jessica Brown, one time told me, when I'm working with a client and I have no idea what to do, what to say, what next step to take, I will just sit and think to myself in my head, I love you so much. I love you so much. So you don't say this out loud because that's a little weird, maybe depending on the relationship that you have with the client. But pulling yourself back to your heart space like that pulls you right back, pulls you right back into the present moment. And you have the ability to offer that present moment presence back to your client.
If you're worried about, I don't know what to do, I don't know how to fix this. That pulls you out of the present moment, that pulls you out of your presence. So being present is such a gift and it creates such a safety structure with the client that you're working with. And again, not something that AI can do or replicate. Another thing that I can't replicate is critical thinking. So I oftentimes think about the type of practitioner that I needed back in the day when I was going through health struggle, I was definitely considered a complex case. And so any of my other complex case people listening to this, you know, we kind of live on the periphery of algorithms. We're the ones that make the clinicians scratch their heads a little bit.
And I want someone who can dive into the murky gray area with me that can dive into that messy middle. I want someone who's ready to roll up their sleeves and do the work, the critical thinking work that is required for complex cases. I didn't want somebody who couldn't think outside the box or, to put it more directly, can't think outside what a bot tells them to do. So here's the deal. The use of ChatGPT and AI is so new, but there is some research coming out that is suggesting that AI overuse can reduce our ability to think critically, can lower our problem solving skills, can negatively impact independent thought and thinking, and can lead to a worsened memory recall. These are not good things for practitioners. Hard stop. A lot of our cognitive functioning is use it or lose it.
And so before I start outsourcing anything to AI, I first ask myself, am I comfortable with losing this skill? Am I comfortable with diminished skill in this area? If the answer is no, I am not going to outsource it at all or as much so I really, really, really want you guys to think about this. There are a lot of AI tools coming out now that interpret functional labs for practitioners. They can build protocols for practitioners. You can upload a lab right now to ChatGPT and say, come up with a protocol. To me, this is scary for our industry. Not because I'm worried that it will render functional practitioners obsolete, but because I'm worried that it will completely collapse our reputation if we all of a sudden have a ton of. And I'm using air quote here. Functional medicine practitioners using AI to do their job to interpret labs and build protocols for their clients.
That is not good. If you have a bunch of air quotes. Functional medicine practitioners outsourcing their work to AI in losing that skill themselves. This isn't good for our industry's reputation. Here's what I mean by that. Functional medicine is brought forth as a solution to a problem problem. The problem being conventional medicine's algorithmic templated approach to healthcare. If that, then this, if your lab show this, then we do this.
So conventional medicine typically waits until there's a diagnosis to be made and then the diagnosis guides the treatment. So a lot of people are left behind, lost in struggling with that model. You know this. If you're listening to this podcast, you know this. So functional medicine swoops in and says, says we do things differently. We listen. We take our time with you. We look for root causes, we think outside the box, we think critically to pull all the pieces and parts together for you.
So if we forfeit the think critically part of this, I think we forfeit the very thing that sets us apart as an industry and makes us excellent clinicians. So this is why in my team and my company, we are absolutely not outsourcing lab analysis in protocol development to AI when we're assessing labs in our practice. This is exactly how I train and teach practitioners, not just on my team, but in FNA as well. We're doing what I call reading beyond the data, seeing the human being behind the data points. This quote that I've shared a bazillion times here on the podcast, but it really, really guides my entire way of thinking about how we practice. Gabor Mate says the more specialized doctors become, then the more they know about a body part or an organ and the less they tend to understand the human being in whom that part or organ resides. So we practice what I call intuitive functional medicine, whole human care. And guess what? The whole human has to be fully present in order for us to do that.
Our clients are more than just their labs. Healing is more than just lab interpretation in protocol building.
So I'm not a huge fan of the term anti aging because aging is a privilege and something to celebrate. However, I do want to continue to look and feel good as I age, which is why I take take Qualytic, the first of its kind formula designed to help your body naturally eliminate senescent cells. These are a big culprit behind that middle aged feeling. They're also known as zombie cells and when they accumulate they can lead to less energy, slower workout recovery, joint discomfort, and basically just feeling old. Qualious analytic is something you only have to take two days a month. I line them up for myself and my husband so we can both age better at the cellular level. Feeling more youthful and energized. To experience the science of feeling younger, go to qual life.com funk for up to 50% off your purchase and use code funk for an additional 15% off. That's Q-U-A-L-I-Alife.com/FUNK for an extra 15% off your purchase. Your older self will thank you and thanks to Qualia for sponsoring this episode.
I am so excited to announce a new sponsor with you guys, Bon Charge. I love this brand. They make the most incredible products and the one that I've been using and loving for the past six months is their red light light face mask. The past few years, my rosacea and the redness on my face has gotten worse. Now you guys know the deal. Skin is an inside job. Our gut health, what we're eating really impacts the health of our skin. So we do have to support our skin internally, but it can also be supported externally as well. And that's where the Bon Charge red light face mask has come in for me. I use it about three to four times a week, 10 minutes a pop. It's super easy. I do it first thing in the morning and I have noticed, noticed less redness and even a more even skin tone. Other things that the red light mask can help with are fine lines and wrinkles, acne, eczema, sore jaw and migraines. Red light therapy is awesome. It's hugely researched. There's thousands of peer reviewed studies on it. So if you want to take advantage of red light therapy, go to boncharge.com and use the coupon code funk to save 15%. That's B -O-N-C-H-A-R-G-E.com and use coupon code FUNK to save 15%.
Now I am sure that more and more practitioners will lean on AI for lab interpretation and protocol management. Why? Because it's a lot easier and a lot cheaper and a lot less time intensive than doing it yourself. It's also a lot more efficient. And with functional medicine growing as much as it is, I'm sure bigger clinics will require their practitioners to leverage AI in some way for efficiency. And now as a CEO of a company, I can tell you efficiency is extremely important. And as a practitioner, I will tell you with my whole fucking chest, I didn't get into this line of work to be an efficient worker. We, myself and my clinical team got into this work because we have a deep passion for helping people heal and transform. Now I know I have enough self awareness to know that I can be a little self righteous when I'm locked into an idea of the way way things should be done.
But this is one I'm kind of digging my heels in on. And like I said earlier, if your business model or your practice or your services is created around doing what anyone can prompt AI to do for free, this is going to become a problem for you. That's the shit that's going to render people obsolete. It's that. Which means the practitioners that are practicing with their whole heart are going to stand out. Mark my words, you will. So another thing that AI can't replace is intuition. I was having a conversation with Rachel last month.
She's our lead practitioner and the lead clinical mentor of fna, and we were having a leadership meeting talking about labs, and she said, sometimes it's just intuition, you know, sometimes it's not the lab. It's just like my gut sense. And I'm like, yes, a trillion percent, yes. I will say that that clinician intuition definitely comes with time, it comes with practice, it comes with experience. But I actually had one of our clients DM me and say, AI has no chance against Rachel's intuition and insight. So even clients feel this, okay? They know, okay? Something else that AI can absolutely replace is copywriting. So if you hate copywriting, this is good news for you. But the question that I have is, just because it can replace it, does that mean that it should? So this is what I come back to, too.
I personally don't want to lose my ability to be a strong writer, so I am not going to outsource 100% of my writing. Are there places and spaces that I will use it? Yeah, for sure. But most of my writing is done for, from my brain to my fingertips. So if my team or I use ChatGPT to write an email or draft a sales page or create a launch email or something like that, we are always 100% of the time going back in with discernment. So the human being needs to step in. And I'm pretty critical about this stuff. I'll be like, oh, that's cringe. Like, ew.
Like, I would never say that. Or this is fluff. Like, what does that even mean? This is just fluff and stuff. Or like, the words need to be very intentionally created or a big one is. My audience wouldn't say that. Our client base wouldn't use those words. So we're not going to use those words. And how do I know this? I know this through relationships.
I know this through having real conversations with real people and listening to them. That's another thing that AI cannot reproduce real relationships in real conversations. So that is crucial. If you're going to be leveraging ChatGPT or AI for copywriting, make sure you are going through it, because there needs to be some human component. I mean, you know exactly when you're reading a CHAT GPT email. I'm a very kinesthetic person, so I'm always sensing things, but it feels plastic to Me, it feels like fake, it feels inorganic. There's. It just hits differently.
I can just, I'm like, oh, this was chat GPT. And one of the things that I'm saying to my team of like, we're not here to just barf chatgpt all over the world. Like that's not what we're doing here. So that's my thought on using AI to write words for you. The other thing that AI cannot replace is community. It can't build trust, it can't build culture, it can't build relationships. And we're going to really be talking into this concept in next week's workshop. Because if you're creating a course course or a program or a new offering, it cannot just be another course with more information for all the reasons that we already discussed.
It needs to be experiential. So we're going to address the different ways you can really do that successfully. You know, AI cannot tell you who your community is. AI can't tell you who your unique audience is. The only way you figure that out is by building the relationships, having the actual conversations with the actual humans. And I'm going to tell you this, if you don't have a strong, clear point of view, AI isn't going to give you that either. It's not going to be able to give that to you. Who you are, what you do, what you stand for, that's the human in you, that's on you to pull forward.
And the people that don't will flounder in. The people that do will stand out. And again, this is yet another way that AI has kind of leveled the playing field in some ways. You can't be saying what everyone else is saying anymore. If you are barfing out the same chat GPT as the next guy, you're eventually going to lose this game. You have to be speaking from your unique experience in your lens. And so if you're worried about AI, really think to yourself, what can I do and offer that AI cannot? And then lean the fuck in. Okay, let's close out with four things that I really, really think you should be focusing on in the next year, in years to come.
I heard Natalie Ellis mention a few core principles to lock in if you want to be around for the next five years. So I'm going to talk to you about four of them that I want you to focus on. Number one, deep specialization. I personally have always been a little anti niche before that was even like cool or thing. I just didn't want to niche Down. But what I have done is niched my group programs and that's a big thing we're going to talk about next week. If you don't have a niche, or even if you do, we're going to talk about how you can really niche down your group programs. So each program that you build, if you choose to build more than one, can have a deep core focus.
So you can really specialize in that thing. Number two, high integrity transformations. If you are selling transformation, you need to architect, organize an experience that actually gets people there. It's another thing we'll talk about next week. Number three is ecosystem thinking. So building ecosystems rather than a linear program. So specifically thinking about group programs, we're going to really talk about how to orchestrate this, how to curate this. If you are going to create a program, I will talk to you about how I've successfully navigated this and also how I've unsuccessfully done it.
So you can learn from what works and what doesn't. But rather than building out this very linear system of this is exactly the path to take, take more ecosystem. So giving people different ways to interact. And that's where a big part of the community aspect comes in as well. And that human interaction that we really, really, really need to be prioritizing. And then finally, number four is building out a proprietary framework. So your ip, your intellectual property, and the way to do this is via your lived experience, how you see the world, what your unique perspective is, and then you build a framework from that. That is something that I will say I really do specialize in.
If I want to give myself some flowers, my own flowers. And I really help practitioners and business owners find their unique voice and lens. So we're going to bring that into next week's class as well. So if this conversation felt helpful at all for you, you can definitely join me for next week's masterclass. If not, I would really start to think about different ways that you can can implement this. Maybe pull out a journal after you listen to this, or listen to it a couple of times and take notes of how you can implement some of these strategies into your practice. This is something that I've been really, really, really spending a lot of time thinking through myself personally. Before we close out, I'm going to leave you with a quote or a thought.
I was listening to a podcast on spirituality and psychology, but the guest said something that really stood out to me. He was talking about his patients and he says, they say they want it, but their heart isn't in it. So they're not able to work hard enough to achieve it. He went on to say that the ability to do what it takes to get the thing that you really want requires two things. Outside of hard work, it requires two things. Inspiration, empathy, passion. Those are two things you guys, that AI cannot give you. That's all you.
That's all heart, babe. So if you know you've got the inspiration, you've got the passion to do this work, lean all the way into it. I really, really feel like the next year to two years is going to be a time that sort of separates the men from the boys, so to speak. And. And I would hate to see us lose some really heart centered, compassionate, caring, kind practitioners to the fear of AI. So again, I hope that this was helpful for you in some way, shape or form. If it was DM me, let me know and otherwise I'll see you next week. I'll see some of you guys in the masterclass and I'll just see some of you guys back here on the podcast.
We'll be talking about the gut. All right, see ya.
Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Functional Nutrition Podcast. Please keep in mind this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment.
If you got something from today's show, don't forget, subscribe, leave a review, share with a friend, and keep coming back for more. Take care of you.