What the talk is
Twenty to thirty minutes. Long enough for an argument, short enough for a room that has been sitting since the morning.
Told, not presented. No slides are needed. The talk is built on a family story across four generations and three continents, from the book SuperSkills, and on what that story says about the tools arriving now.
One idea to take home. AI makes everyone faster. People still decide what matters, and the skills that let them do it are the ones worth protecting.
During or after dinner. Between the starter and the main, between the main and dessert, or once the plates are cleared: whichever suits the running order.
Questions if you want them. Ten minutes after the talk, or none. Many after-dinner rooms are better without.
Where it works
Annual dinners of associations, professional bodies and member networks.
Conference dinners on the first night, when the next day’s programme needs a room that is already talking.
Awards evenings, as the talk before the awards.
Client and partner dinners hosted by a firm. The formats for those are at client dinners and events.
Leadership dinners at the end of an offsite, when the team has worked all day and needs the argument without the workshop.
Which talk
For a mixed room, the after-dinner version of We Are Superheroes. For a room of leaders, the after-dinner version of Drift versus Design. Both are described in full at keynotes.
What the evening needs
A lectern or a handheld microphone, the running order with the time I go on, and a line on who will be there. Everything else, from the bios to the introduction your host can read, is in the speaker pack.
The three keynotes, and which one fits
Keynotes run 30 to 90 minutes, in person or virtual. A 30-minute main-stage version of each talk is available for conferences, and the full talk runs 45 to 60 minutes. The sector examples are chosen for each audience, around the same argument. All three, with the showreel, are at keynotes, and the programme copy is at the speaker pack.
Drift versus Design
Drift versus Design: why most organisations hand their judgement to AI without deciding to, and how to design your way through instead.
Most organisations are adopting AI by drift: a thousand reasonable decisions that add up to judgement nobody chose to give away. Rahim Hirji, author of SuperSkills, shows leaders which mode they are running, where AI sharpens judgement and where it weakens it, and hands them the controls.
We Are Superheroes
We Are Superheroes: AI is the suit. The human decides.
AI makes everyone faster, stronger and more capable. It does not decide; people do. Through a family story across four generations and three continents, Rahim Hirji hands the audience the seven human skills that grow more valuable as the tools spread. It is a talk about people first and technology second.
WTH (What the Human)
WTH (What the Human): a live test of a leadership team's own judgement.
Most leadership teams have never seen their own judgement on AI tested. In three acts, Rahim Hirji shows a leadership team what AI is changing in how organisations run, then ends with a live test of the team's own judgement, live and unrehearsed. The answers are the team's own.
