How AI Levels the Playing Field for Small Business

Mark Smith 00:00:06
Welcome to the MVP show. My intention is that you listen to the stories of these MVP guests and are inspired to become an MVP and bring value to the world through your skills.
 If you have not checked it out already, I do a YouTube series called how to become an MVP. The link is in the show notes. With that Let's get on with the Show.

Mark Smith 00:00:35
Today's guest joins me from Washington in the US. She's the CEO and director of US Strategies and Innovations and NDC tech consultancy that has been a Microsoft Phone MVP since 2019. She's actually ducked out for a period with Microsoft and then back in again in 2024. She's a true force in the tech world. She's accomplished speaker, author, leader, board member, event organizer, and passion. The Advocate, who works, span everything from care packages for soldiers to mentoring young people and SharePoint and Office 365 encoding through her company. She continues to empower nonprofits and Dr. Community impact around the world. You'll find her bio and social links in the show notes for this episode. Please join me in welcoming the incredible Nakia.

Nikkia Carter 00:01:22
Thank you. Glad to be here.

Mark Smith 00:01:25
Welcome, welcome. Welcome. So good to be speaking to you. I'm I'm very keen to hear your journey in tech and the fact that you've been an MVP, went to Microsoft, came back out and as MVP again. But before we go there, tell me a bit about food, family and fun. What do you? Do when you're not working.

Nikkia Carter 00:01:42
Oh, that's kind of hard since I'm running my own business. Working is kind of part of life right now, but I'm hanging out with my family, who also works in the business except for our youngest. So mostly transitioning from one stage of, you know, of work. To hanging out with the family, maybe exercising. I like exercising, so I usually do that on a daily basis or the weekly daily basis. UM&UM other than that, you know, it's been a lot more in the house time.

Mark Smith 00:02:24
How did you get started in tech?

Nikkia Carter 00:02:27
Well, if I go back back when I was, I don't know, I was in in my moms house. Still, I was in my teens. Early teens, preteens or early teens. And I don't know if you remember the store RadioShack well. You. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. OK, so you remember. OK, so there used to be a computer called a Tandy colour computer 3. So my dad bought that for us and it came with a book, learning the program basic. So I took that book and I started teaching myself how to program and I liked it. So then when I flash forward, I get to high school. And since I went to a science engineering school, they had a computer computer science course. So I went, I did my classes and I was, you know, whizzing through. I was helping other people and, you know, just like, look, just give me that because. You don't. Can't. Do it. I'll just get you by so you can pass. But you know, just helping people. Out so that they could. Get through the class helped me to understand that and as easy as I had. It just helped me to understand. Oh, I might be good at this. So then flash forward to college. At first I kind of got sidetracked into aerospace engineering because I kind of wanted to also do that. I also wanted to be in genetics, but. I realized how long it would take to earn the kind of money and get on the projects I wanted to get on, so I was. Like. Got computer science. So I got side tracked and then I put myself back on the track and I've been on it ever since.

Mark Smith 00:04:19
Nice, nice. Very interesting and and taking Korea, my first computer was at Tandy, so I remember it well. The very first one I purchased for myself outside of class in school and stuff like that. OK, so that's an interesting journey. How did you the first time around, you became an MVP in 2019 was that right? Yes.

Nikkia Carter 00:04:41
Yes, and that was off office and apps. I think, I think this.

Mark Smith 00:04:47
What were you doing at that time? Were you doing a lot of SharePoint work?

Nikkia Carter 00:04:49
Uh, yeah, so running another Microsoft partner company. Again, this was at the end of the company time before I sold my first company and. I had been doing SharePoint work for a while. Office 365 work came in and of course after that. But I had been in the community, so I've been speaking. I helped with arranging user group communities. I started running my own or helping other people run as well, and then running conferences or like day conferences, not like the big Microsoft Type Conference, but, you know. Little community conference. And someone or a couple of people just was like, so, you know, which MVP are you? And I'm like MVP, I'm not MVP. So I kept getting that so many times and then somebody was like, look, I'm just going to nominate you. So I went through the process, had to go through it a couple of times though, because you have to be very specific and precise in the way that you do the application. And if you don't. Yeah. So I had to go through that a couple of times and then somebody coached me and was like, look, you got to be very specific, precise. So once I did that, that was the first time I got it.

Mark Smith 00:06:07
Nice. And you only had it for a wee while and then? You went and joined Microsoft.

Nikkia Carter 00:06:11 
One month exactly. It was kind of funny because. I was applying for Microsoft jobs the whole time I was applying for the MVP and I kept doing it to my husband saying. It it would be hilarious if I at the same time that I get the MVP like right after it, I get the job because then I would have to let my MVP go. And sure enough I got the MVP 1st and then I learned like a week or two later. That I was going to be hired and then, you know, the the dates ended up wearing it on the was the MVP for a month, so yeah.

Mark Smith 00:06:47
Wow. That's incredible. That's incredible. But you obviously moved on from Microsoft and you became an MVP in 2024. Is your focus now really around more copilot or more? Holistic, you know, modern work.

Nikkia Carter 00:07:02 
More holistic, modern work. Although I do focus on SharePoint and copilot a lot. But do a lot of power apps power automate? You know, making sure people's processes work well. People can work together, people you know pulling their hair out all day trying to figure out where their paper went or who's got what. And you know who was supposed to be on this project and who was responsible for that, you know? You know, fixing those types of issues and helping the collaboration go smoother. Is what we.

Mark Smith 00:07:34
Do nice. What's your take on? Copilot and and I suppose even more broadly, AI in general over your career you would have seen a lot. Of changes in how software is being used in the context of business. Is it the same is just? Is this just new technology or are you what what? Are you seeing?

Nikkia Carter 00:07:57
UM, well, it's been technology that we've had for a while. Excuse me in certain things, like, you know, Alexa, but then. Now talking to you though, actually, Alexa, OK, you know, but even going back before that, we had some things like even search engines. They're kind of like that thing that we could ask a question in natural language and get back answers. Sometimes the answers weren't all that great. But it was kind of the steps towards. That I remember studying, studying the school, and now I'm like, Dang, I wish I would stayed in. Because it's so cool. But it also can be you know something that we need to be. Careful about how it's developed so that we make sure we don't leave people behind. We don't cause, you know, unnecessary problems in the society by, you know, doing things that. Humans would, you know, with with emotion, may be swayed, but computers are ones and 0 so you should be very careful about how things are programmed and how ethically things are rolled out. And then the safety on the other side for the consumer. Understanding that AI is a great tool, it will help you get through lots of stuff a whole lot faster. But. You still need the person, so you still got to be there. You still got to check it because it's still not, you know, sometimes it hallucinates, sometimes it pulls back just. A bunch of. Old stuff, you know? It just happens. So you have to make sure that you're refining your question, you know, reviewing what's going through going on, that you're getting back, but also make sure that you're not leaving yourself open to security risks because a lot of people are now like. Ohh. Or or maybe not more security risk as. As more of a business risk. So you know, a lot of business owners now are like, yeah, AI is going to help me. You know, I don't have to hire as many people. I'm going to get so much done. But they they don't think about. First of all, you may also still need the person if you already have the person getting rid of the person. That's not a good idea. You should keep the person and add the AI, not get rid of the person and replace them with the AI. But if you don't already have people having AI agents act as. Those types of people can help you out a lot. But you want to be careful about being in those free spaces because you're feeding data into these platforms like, not Microsoft Copilot, but. Where they may not necessarily be privacy. You know, there may not be any privacy. Microsoft usually holds up onto his privacy, even for people who are anonymous. Or have a free account that's not the same for all companies so you know people need to make sure that if they're going to use it, they should pay for it. Or use a reputable company that they know will not do something like use their data to train the AI, and then it possibly come out in somebody else's, you know, data. And or if you're used, even if you're using Microsoft's copilot and you're using the free version, sign in to make sure that that data stays your data. Encapsulated in your account and they won't touch it, so you know lots of great advantages. Love, copilot, love the way it's going. It's still, you know, of course, some some way to be had because you know, AI is is changing and evolving and getting better, but it has helped me. And my team so much in our work day-to-day. So, yeah, big proponents of it just got to make sure we're.

Mark Smith 00:12:08
Safe. Yeah, I I totally. I love that. Totally agree. What? What are? The scenarios that you're seeing that really just lend themselves to copilot. Like I said there, there's now these new role I don't even I can't remember what they're called, but they're like. It's like having an agent that would handle HR or having an agent that would handle accounting. So like I said, if you didn't already have that accountant or that HR person, the agent could help you, but then there's just other scenarios like building proposals.

Nikkia Carter 00:12:49 
You know, responding, responding in great detail to RFPs, especially when you already have other samples that you can feed the the, the, the AI along with the ask excuse me and then you also train the AI to know your company and and know you so that. Bills and all that data properly. But when you put all those pieces of data together or give it all those files and you tell it to make your proposal and you want it in this type of format. And you're, you know, pretty descriptive about what you want, just like if you were to tell your secretary this is how to do it or your intern. This is what I want. You can get back a pretty, you know, pretty decent starting ground for, you know, your next steps, which can save you so much time and energy.

Mark Smith 00:13:42 
Do you think companies are are are? Are adopting it quickly. Is it in your observation with the companies that you're working with the customers that you're working with? Are they embracing it or is there, you know, what's their, what's the temperature like of of folks that you're working with?

Nikkia Carter 00:13:59 
There's definitely a lot of curiosity, a lot of people asking the question. A lot of people wanted to know what our services are around it and what they should do and how they should handle the journey and things like that because it is a journey you don't want to just turn on copilot, you want to make sure everything. All the hat, all the hatches, hatches are battened down. And. Security policies and everything's in place, so you don't, you know, end up giving up secrets to your employees by mistake. But. OK. And then my brain just shut off or? What you whatever.

Mark Smith 00:14:34 
That's all right. So what? What's the temperature you're seeing from organizations that are, you know, their their rate of keen, keen to explore it? Keen. To get involved.

Nikkia Carter 00:14:42 
Yeah, very keen to explore very much wanting to know what are the next steps, but still shy about going about. It kind of reminds me of the early days of cloud. When everybody was like, oh, the clouds here I can I can kind of see the benefits, but I don't know. I'm. I'm I'm scared. I I you know I like my server. I like my control. You know, I'm. Not. Sure, the technology is going to not cause more problems. Then solve problems. You know, I'm not sure exactly how this works and how it's going to be a super benefit to my company. I can kind of see it, but I can't fully see it. That's what we're experiencing. Now with AI. They can kind of see it, but they can't really see it. And then there's a lot of curiosity and people wanting to do, but then they're like, should we? Is this necessary or are we just chasing the shiny which you know? I definitely could understand. You don't want to be one of those companies that's just throwing dollars after the latest and greatest high tech just because you got money, you could do something else with that so. You know, I understand the caution. But I think that especially for smaller businesses, this is a game changer. It helps you get on the level of organizations. It's just like the cloud, it was it cloud kind of democratized software where it helped it. It helped it to be. More affordable for the average person and then not having to have your own server, your own server closet your all you know, all the electricity and cooling and maintenance and all of that that goes into all of that. So that kind of like leveled the playing field there a bit. Now this AI is kind of leveling the playing field when it comes to being able to have access to that knowledge base that comes back to you with actual usable knowledge from you asking certain things and then giving it back to you and even developing things for you like. For documents, PowerPoint presentations, you know, things like that.

Mark Smith 00:17:15 
It's interesting that you highlighted that value to small business because I've always, you know, if I look at my early days of my career, which was 30 odd years ago, as in you started with, you would have to literally build a server for a company. You would set up the e-mail server, you would set up the SharePoint Server. Was it wasn't called SharePoint back then and you would go through all these processes and spend a lot of money if only one person was to use it. Now for a very low subscription rate. Let's say you got an E5 license for one person to start a company. You get so much value for that monthly usage cost. The same with the $30.00 for Co M365 copilot. If it saves you 2 hours a a month, you've you've covered it right two to three hours and you're gonna get so much more value out of that. Is there any kind of and? And this is my last question is we got to wrap up. Is there any kind of? Your own personal discovery of M365 copilot that you just here's how I use it and This is why it's wonderful.

Nikkia Carter 00:18:27
OK, so I would I had one, but then one of my friends, one of my partner friends just went up to me. So I gotta I gotta share this. If you know you, you know how you go to business meetings and you're trying to figure out, you know about this, this person that you're about to meet, they might have set up just a random call. So you're like, where did they come from? Who is this person? But they don't put anything in the notes for the in the calendar invite, so you have no. Yeah. So you could go to there. You could find them on LinkedIn, go to their LinkedIn, download their profile and then feed it into LinkedIn and tell I mean, and then feed it into the AI. So whether you're using ChatGPT, or perplexity or whatever, or Chuck copilot you just. Drag that PDF directly into the chat space where you'd be type. And tell it to analyze the file and it will give you like the strength of the person, the weaknesses, their profile, their company. It just pulls back so much information. And then if the AI knows you, you can also cross reference it like hey. What kind of things should I be talking to this customer about, you know, and a lot of times, you know, sometimes you'll ask a question or you'll be thinking. Oh. I don't know if the AI can answer that question. It might not be able to, but a lot of times it can't, and even if it can't, it's learning as you're asking so you know you have the larger model that's learning from the larger scale, but that's not. Your personal stuff. So the AI model is also going to learn you and your style and what you do and all of that stuff. So the more you ask and the more you interact with it, even trivial stuff. You know, asking it, you know, when's the movies going to close around the corner? Today, you. Know. Just doing stuff like that. It just gets the model. The AI is so used to you that it's able to start predicting and giving you back better data that is useful for you so you know. Say, ask away, just just ask.

Mark Smith 00:20:44
I love it. I love it. I'm gonna even try what you just described then, because it sounds an amazing and powerful tool. I'll give it a go. Any final words for folks? Maybe aspiring to become an MVP that any advice you'd share with them?

Nikkia Carter 00:21:00 
First of all, make sure that you're doing your your stuff every month. You need to have a contribution every month. Now you could do one, but I highly suggest you do at least 2. Like A blog, maybe a video blog. It doesn't have to be real long, but something good and meaty with, you know, good detail that people and and an easy and it. Cater to your audience, so if you're talking to business owners, don't talk. You know, super tech, but. Evangelizing the products that you know and love in the way that help your customers or the people that you work with. Is the best way to get your MVP first of all to do a couple of things a month. If you can, you know, help host the user group that helps. And then do blog once a month. You know that's 22 activities and if you're hosting the user group, you don't have to be the one that speaks all the time. You're just helping organize the user group so that also counts because you're still, you're still invigilating and helping get the word out about Microsoft products. So one to two. But it's more things that you the more things you can do. The. Better make sure you're doing at least one activity each month. I think you have to be in for a minute, so if you just started in the tech, you know you might want to wait till you're about two years in and then apply. Because I'm starting to see that like some of the. Ones that maybe newer just got in or just not really as recognized. You know they they tell you to reapply. But anyway apply and then don't be discouraged. Reapply if you have to. And just Please remember when you're putting in your details, this will save you. Put in all of the details, all of the links, every event, every blog, catalyze every categorize everything individually. Yes, it's painful, but that's the way you get your MVP. If you don't have enough detail and you don't. Categorize each individual event that you've done each individual blog that you've done every little bit of code that you've contributed, whatever it is that you've contributed to the community. If you don't do that, then your chances will be slim.

Mark Smith 00:23:33
Hey, thanks for listening. I'm your host business application MVP, Mark Smith, otherwise known as the NZ 365 Guy. If you like the show and wanna be a supporter, check out buy me a coffee.com/NZ 365 guide. Thanks again and see you next time.