Work Is Not Finite: Staying Irreplaceable as AI Raises the Bar with Heidi Darling

Mandy Hornaday: Hey, Heidi. Welcome to Growth Activated. I’m so excited to have you here today. Heidi Darling: Hey, Mandy, it’s great to be here. Thanks for having me. Mandy Hornaday: So Heidi, why don’t you give us the sixty-second snapshot of your background and what you’re doing here? I’m super excited to talk to you, because we were both fractional CMOs and worked alongside each other, and I just so appreciated our partnership. So why don’t you give us a little more detail? Heidi Darling: Yeah, thank you. And likewise — I always appreciated your strategic approach and your kind of maniacal customer obsession, which I share. So, a little about me. I’ve been in marketing my whole career. I started in my twenties in luxury hospitality, which was amazingly fun to do in your twenties, because you got to travel and do all these cool things. But post-kids, I was home on mat leave and got bored, so I started a startup. It was accepted into an incubator, and then I was funded. So I was like, well — I guess I need to do this. And I did, and it was like a radical crash-course MBA in startups. I made all the classic first-founder mistakes. It was a vitamin, not a pill — a cool idea, but not necessarily an easy thing to monetize. So I pivoted after about a year and a half. I spoke with the founder of Pandora, and he was like, “Yeah, good luck trying to monetize that. We still haven’t figured it out.” And I was like, okay, my takeaway is I love startups. So I went to work for a robotic exoskeleton company, and that was another classic startup wild ride — two years, uplisted to Nasdaq. And that began my love affair with startups. I’ve done mostly enterprise — all the classic B2B, consumer, and enterprise plays, a lot of marketplace and platform plays, and all tech. I’m in the Bay Area, so the shoe fits. About three years ago, my dad was sick and I was taking care of him, and I thought, I need to pause, but I don’t want to be completely out — because AI was just hitting and I wanted to stay relevant. Fractional work was a really good way to do that. It was a really good way to stay in the game, have impact, help, mentor, but also take some time for my own personal life. Mandy Hornaday: I love that. What a great reason to go fractional, too. When you say that, it inspires me — I’d never really thought about it like that. One of the reasons I love being fractional is because I get to travel the world, which has been a dream. My twenty-year-old self would be glowing if she knew I was finally doing this. And the freedom to not have to work forty hours a week if I don’t want to is such a blessing. There are a lot of different reasons for that, obviously. Now, I know you recently went back in-house and took a job at a startup. So tell us about that — what caused you to make the leap? Does it have anything to do with AI and being able to fully immerse yourself in it, or were there other reasons? Heidi Darling: The best way I can describe it is that it just felt like a calling. And I’ll go back to whether or not you’re cut out to be fractional as a human. I think it’s a set of personality traits that allow you to be fractional, or don’t. I’m an all-in kind of girl. So even if I was fractional, ostensibly for fifteen hours a week — and I have a high bar — if I saw that something needed to be done to be correct, or to out-compete, then I’m working thirty hours a week, because it needs to be correct. I’ve always been that way. In fact, my friends were like, “Ha, you’re fractional, that’s funny.” So I was having a reckoning and being honest with myself about what I was actually doing. Was it fractional? And how do I take that high bar, those standards, and that all-in-ness, and put it to best use? So that, coupled with — I’d done B2C2B, consumer, and enterprise plays, I’d built platforms, I’d gone deep in AI, and I’m really mission-driven at the core. I was born in Guatemala, and my parents were there helping Indigenous communities. That’s a strong core of me. And this platform, Savo, gives everyone a voice and puts human intelligence at the center — elevated as a layer above AI. I really believe in that. So when I say it was a calling, those are all the pieces, right? Every part of my career had laddered up to launching this platform. From a heart place, it felt right, and from a personality-trait place, it felt right. Mandy Hornaday: That’s great. And I can attest — I’ve always admired how AI-forward you are. We all have so much to learn from you, paired with your high performance and high bar. So I’d love to talk about what this looks like for you today, in terms of what high performance looks like in the AI era. Because I can tell you, as a high achiever, I’m more tired than I’ve ever been. I feel like I’m working more than I ever have — which is funny, because AI is supposed to make us more efficient. And in a lot of ways it does, but it also opens up this world of possibilities we maybe didn’t know was there before. What’s your experience been like? Walk me through that. Heidi Darling: Yeah, very astute observation. The way I phrase it is: work is not finite. So if you’re more efficient at certain pieces of your work that took up a lot of time, and suddenly that chunk is taken care of, then your aperture has expanded, and you’re able to do so much more. Everyone’s bar is rising. And then there are all these parallel conversations of, well, just because you can put a bunch of stuff out there doesn’t mean it’s great. Or, if all seventeen LLMs are processing the question the same way, now we’re in a sameness problem, right? All the go-to-market strategies are the same, all the content outputs and strategies are the same — because you’re giving them the same inputs. And whether you’re a B2B company that does XYZ or a B2B company that does the other XYZ, how are you going to compete if you don’t have different inputs, and more human inputs? I was just reading a fascinating article yesterday: prompts without human elements — human intelligence, human artifacts, if you will — that generated content output for a month had no quotable snippets showing up in LLMs. This came out from Gong, actually. If you dropped recordings of customer conversations in as part of the prompt — human input, human intelligence — sixty-nine percent showed up in LLMs. It’s a little bit of a squirrel, but it makes the point that, A, work is not finite, and B, just because it’s being done doesn’t mean it’s achieving the goals. So when we think about what our strategy is, what our goals are, and what’s actually achieving them — you have to be really specific in how you structure AI to help you get there. Mandy Hornaday: Something that was coming to mind as you were talking — and it’s something I’ve been wondering myself — is, as the bar raises in this sense of work not being finite, which I think is such a great way to think about it, it’s sort of infinite, the amount that can be done on any given day. And it really comes down to choosing the right things. But how are you thinking about what should be expected from your teams and employees? Because if you’re ten times more efficient and providing ten times more outcomes because you’ve figured out how to leverage AI, versus the team that isn’t — does the bar just raise, and we all get paid the same? I was telling my husband the other day: if I’m leveraging AI in a really powerful way and it takes me an hour to do something, but my peer isn’t using AI and it takes them five hours for the same work — they’re going to bill five hours, and I’m only billing one, but we got to the same output. So it’s a really interesting conversation. Heidi Darling: Yeah, I think that’s correct. I’ll say that you’ll be employed longer, because value is value. And I think it’s requiring us to get back to the honest conversations — and the moral strength to say, “I’m worth this.” I feel comfortable saying I need sleep, I need nutrition, I need exercise, I need quality of life, for anything to be sustainable and for me to provide strong output and strategic thinking over the long term. Burnout is not a thing; it produces the worst output. And if you’ve lived through a few cycles of this, you can have that inner core of strength to say, “I’m putting up a wall. And if this isn’t a good fit because you value crappy output over strategic, quality output, then that’s okay.” But we all have to have that moral strength. I don’t know if morality is involved — I tend to think it is, because I think we’re all responsible for creating the future we want for each other. So what could be expected is just what’s reasonable. You expect to be a critical thinker. You expect to always put what you do through the lens of, “How much impact am I creating? Is this just AI spin-out, or is this actual impact?” And beyond that, you can expect me to be supportive of the plan, and upholding of the strategy. That’s how you’re a good partner. That’s how you’re a good asset to any company. I’ll say one other thing: you can also expect me to be humble and say, “I don’t know,” because things are changing all the time. Even last month, I would have said I thought PR was hand-to-hand combat — it’s all about your relationships. I used to say it’s about your Rolodex, but that’s how old I am. But now I’m like, gosh, I don’t know. The fact that I can have this incredibly smart agent scan the news every day and customize a pitch based on what’s relevant is maybe more impactful than your network. So that’s an example of: be prepared to change your mind at any point. Everything’s changing so quickly. Mandy Hornaday: With that, how are you operating differently? I know we could all be creating skills and agents and the different things we’re playing around with, and that’s probably a given. But as a CMO, are you noticing any core changes in how you’re operating or running your day-to-day in this new world? Or what are you thinking forward about — like, okay, I’m going to have to revisit this in a quarter, in six months? Heidi Darling: Yeah, a couple of things. One is, I used to think it was a little frivolous to spend time getting caught up on the news every day of what’s being released. Now I think it’s critical. I didn’t start using Claude Design until five days after it came out, and I was like, oh my gosh, I should have started the first day it came out. It completely opened my eyes to what’s possible. I’ve always been a woman of action, but even more so now — just get in there, start playing with it, start using it, because you have to. You have to get into the weeds. And you have to be able to ping-pong between thirty-thousand feet and the weeds, thirty-thousand feet and the weeds. The other thing I’m really grappling with is — we outsource work to agencies, so how do you work with agencies that are AI-forward? Levels of security and access, so they can get the continuous brain updates. How do you streamline the communication between internal networks and external networks? And then I’m really thinking about: do I hire a human before I build an agentic team? I’m probably going to build an agentic team — I’m designing one right now. And then there’s how that works with every other facet of the company, so there’s one central brain. So I’m thinking about orchestration more than anything else. I’ve been thinking lately, anything is possible. Our CEO was like, “How do we keep track of these? We’re Slacking back and forth.” And I was like, hang on — “Claude, how do we make Slack conversations update CRMs?” And, done. Or, “I’m going to need a pitch deck tomorrow.” Normally that would take a month to get really well. And it was a moment of, that’s… okay. I also tend to believe anything’s possible — you can will it to be true — but even more so now. Mandy Hornaday: Yeah. I can’t remember where I heard it, or maybe I just got inspired by some conversations, but it was this idea that AI can help us put out A-plus work if we really do the work to give it all the information and context it needs. But for me, one of the biggest changes and unlocks personally is that there are certain areas — we all have our strengths and superpowers — and the areas that haven’t been my superpower, where maybe I was a C or a C-plus, now I can do A-level work with AI by my side. Because I do have the context and the strategy, the human part of it, and now I can leverage AI for execution. So it’s been awesome for me in that sense. The other thing I was going to say is, when you talked about orchestration — it’s one thing for marketing to run fast and for us to control our department. It’s another thing for the entire organization to keep up with us, or stay in sync and in alignment. Heidi Darling: Yeah, and I think it’s all interconnected. I’ve always thought about customer experience, or support, marketing, and sales — or revenue — as three pegs on the stool. And especially with product — Savo’s a product-led-growth place, so you need constant customer metadata, feedback, and experiential data to effectively market and provide the right experience. So it’s an infinite loop of input and output. Which is why, yes, I need to set up my agentic team and orchestrate it, but fast-follow, it needs to be connected to every other part of the organization. The only reason I’m not building that out now is because they’re busy building the product. So that’s a next-month problem. But you touched on something that’s so right — knowledge is just commoditized at this point. You can know anything about anything. So it’s really what you do with that knowledge. Mandy Hornaday: Yep. And I want to go back, because I think it’s really interesting — you were talking about staying in tune with what’s happening on a daily, weekly basis, very quickly. For me personally, earlier this year I was consuming LinkedIn daily and learning a ton, but I was also completely burnt out. So one of the things I’ve been doing is choosing one or two people I really trust and want to learn from, tracking with what they share, and letting the rest fall away. What’s your strategy? Heidi Darling: Yeah, that’s exactly right. There are a few people I follow on LinkedIn, or on Instagram, who have great daily updates. I also get the TLDR newsletter. And I find Andreessen Horowitz — I don’t know who they brought on lately, or maybe they just started taking some vitamins, but their newsletter is suddenly fantastic again, a really good summary of what’s going on in the world every day. So the a16z newsletter. And that’s about it. I’d also say I’m really blessed in that my husband and I have a very similar role and very similar bleeding-edge, futuristic bents. We both started using AI three or four years ago, and he’s more advanced than I am. As soon as he could, he built his own agent — I think because he used to be a game developer in college, so he has a lot of comfort with code. So I have this constant thought partner to talk things through and share information with. He finds most of his stuff on Twitter. But I think that’s right — you can’t get completely overwhelmed, but you can spend half an hour to an hour a day on it. And what’s become clear to me, to your point, is areas where you were an A versus areas where you were a C and could be complemented. Domain expertise is still important, but it’s not essential, because you can get that knowledge. It’s your traits. It’s like how we talk about hiring — you hire for the traits, because you can train someone, but you can’t train those traits. So for me, the intellectual-curiosity piece, the constant-learning, growth-mindset piece, and the grit to stick it out — those are what separate people who thrive with AI from people who don’t keep up. Mandy Hornaday: Totally agree. And I know you mentioned you might hire one person. So what role would that be? Is it someone to manage the AI agents? How are you thinking about your one human hire? Heidi Darling: It’s to manage the agents, but also all the field marketing — executive dinners, panels, events. So, yeah. Mandy Hornaday: So the human, human-related marketing that’s really hard to replicate. And would you hire one person for the same role — are you thinking the same person who does field marketing would also run the agents, or are those two different roles? Heidi Darling: Yeah, I’m thinking of those as two different roles. Mandy Hornaday: Anything else top of mind for you right now — that you think other CMOs should be talking about or thinking about? What are you seeing that we’re falling behind on, that you’d give words of caution about? Heidi Darling: A couple of themes have been really top of mind. One is trust — people pay a premium for it. You can build trust a lot of ways, but human-led, human-centered. The other is being uncomfortable, and being comfortable with that. Particularly in marketing, part of it is the presentation: being polished and buttoned-up, all your ducks in a row, your reporting in order. And — I keep wanting to swear, I have such a potty mouth — your stuff is in lockdown, you know? I don’t have a better way of saying it. But lately my mantra has been: get really comfortable with being uncomfortable, because everything is changing so quickly. You really can’t say anything with strong conviction and have it hold. It’s going to change. Mandy Hornaday: Yeah. Now I’ll have to think and ideate around what I’m locked into that I shouldn’t be, and think bigger. Well, Heidi, it’s been so fun talking to you — I could talk to you all day. This has been a great conversation. Any final words? If people want to connect with you, I’m sure they can find you on LinkedIn, and maybe check out what Savo’s doing. Heidi Darling: Yeah, I’d love to show people around Savo — I think it’s an amazing tool for marketers. I just did a brand Savo session for our internal tone of voice, and it was like, oh my gosh, the possibilities are endless. So I’m happy to share Savo with anyone who wants to take a look. And yes, all the usual channels. But mostly — stay curious. It’s going to be great, it’s going to be fun, it’s going to be wild. And I’m so impressed by the life you’ve created for yourself. Go enjoy Croatia for me. Mandy Hornaday: Oh, thank you. Right back at you. We’ll have to have you on again soon. Thanks, Heidi. Bye. Heidi Darling: I’m looking forward to it. Talk soon. Bye.