When AI copies every feature, what's left to sell? | Donald Farmer

For decades, buying a data platform meant buying into a practice, a methodology, a community, a whole way of seeing the work. Now a general-purpose AI model can copy almost any feature from a prompt. So what does a software vendor sell?On this episode of the Data Faces podcast, David Sweenor talks with Donald Farmer, Principal of TreeHive Strategy and a veteran data product leader from Microsoft and Qlik, about practice versus process, why a Tableau analyst stays a Tableau analyst, why "a human in the loop" is so often a cop-out, and the four human attitudes a system can model but never feel.Key takeaways:-Why the technical feature moat has collapsed, and what replaces it-Practice versus process, and why a practice is sticky when features are not-Why community and identity outlast any single feature-"A human in the loop is a cop-out," and how to design the human attitudes in on purpose-Trust, doubt, ambition, and care, the four things AI can simulate but not feelChapters:00:00 Intro01:16 Meeting at the BARC Data and Analytics Retreat03:07 The shoe shop and an analytic mindset at sixteen05:01 First week at Microsoft, briefing a bank08:32 Why companies still run on spreadsheets10:13 Practice versus process12:52 Tableau versus Qlik, and two different practices16:50 Can vendors still compete on features?20:38 Open source, community, and AI22:01 Do businesses have an ethical stance?25:13 "A human in the loop is a cop-out"27:47 The four human attitudes30:50 Intelligence without purpose33:46 Marvin the Paranoid AndroidRead the full blog post: https://tinytechguides.com/blog/data-faces-donald-farmer-ep43-practice-vs-process/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=video&utm_campaign=ep43-donald-farmer&utm_content=descriptionConnect with Donald Farmer: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/donalddotfarmerListen to the Data Faces podcast: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzrDACjTQ4OBoQ8qM1FMGBwYdxvw9BurR Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6SmGkQGvZQSAT1O7g1l2yFApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/data-faces-podcast/id1789416487 Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/8465f3b3-5d41-4c84-a561-bf8af09560e3/data-faces-podcastThe only podcast that tells the human stories and brings you the faces behind the data.#datafacespodcast #practiceVsProcess #AIstrategy #businessIntelligence #agenticAI