When I walked into the opening session at MAICON 2025 in Cleveland, the Marketing Artificial Intelligence Conference, it hit me how much can change in a single year. This was my second time attending, and while last year was full of “what’s coming,” this year was all about “what’s already here.”

The buzz was electric. Conversations weren’t just about prompts or ChatGPT tricks anymore - they were about AI systems, governance, and how to operationalize artificial intelligence safely inside an organization. For a lifelong banker turned digital strategist, that shift was powerful. While community banks might not move at the pace of Silicon Valley startups, we now find ourselves at the same crossroads: AI is no longer theoretical. It’s business critical.

I spent the week asking one question: What really matters here for the leaders of community banks, the people responsible for serving real customers in real communities while keeping compliance bulletproof?

In addition to the article, check out this 39-minute NotebookLM-generated audio overview conversation based on my notes and MAICON resources! 

What I came home with - bankified for your reading pleasure!

1. From Soloist to Conductor: Scaling AI Beyond the Individual

Mike Kaput from the Marketing AI Institute talked about something that instantly clicked: the “Soloist Problem.” A Soloist is that one person on your team who masters ChatGPT, learns to crank out social media posts faster, or uses AI to clean up meeting notes. Useful, sure - but limited. The productivity gains plateau quickly because everything depends on one person’s knowledge.

The real transformation happens when a bank shifts from Soloists to Conductors. Conductors build systems - frameworks that let AI work across departments, not just on one person’s desktop. For banks, that means creating what I call a Prompting Engine: a unified structure for how your team uses AI safely and consistently.

It includes three pillars:

• A Prompt Framework that standardizes how you ask AI for help.
• Knowledge Blocks, which are pre-verified chunks of compliant internal information (like official product descriptions, brand guidelines, or regulatory language).
• A Prompt Library, a shared repository where your best prompts live - audited, reusable, and accessible to everyone.

When you do this right, you unlock exponential productivity. Think 75% time savings on recurring tasks like marketing copy, board reports, or training documentation. But more importantly, you get consistency and compliance. Everyone plays from the same sheet of music.

And this is where WSI comes in. Helping community banks design and operationalize these systems - securely, strategically, and in alignment with your compliance framework - is exactly what we do.

2. AI Literacy Is the New Leadership Skill

If there was one thread running through every session, it was this: AI literacy isn’t optional anymore - it’s foundational.

AI literacy means more than knowing which buttons to press. It’s understanding how to think with AI - how to ask it the right questions, interpret its outputs, and challenge its assumptions. Paul Roetzer called this our “Move 37 Moment,” referencing the Go match where AlphaGo made a move no human expected, forever changing how the game was played. For more on this moment, I suggest checking out the AlphaGo documentary on YouTube for the full (amazing) story. 

In banking terms, this is that moment.

Executives who learn to use AI as a strategic thought partner, not just a task completer, are the ones who will lead their institutions into the next era. Tools like the CRIT Framework - Context, Role, Interview, Task - help leaders frame better questions and push AI beyond simple output toward insight.

But it’s also about balance. The smartest banks aren’t replacing people; they’re elevating them. The right mindset is “automate the task, not the job.” Use AI to handle the repetitive, time-draining work - drafting reports, pulling data, summarizing meetings - so your people can focus on complex, human-centric work like relationship banking and strategic problem solving.

For individual bankers, this is where The LinkedBanker community really shines. It’s where we help professionals build their own AI literacy, not just to keep up - but to stand out. To use AI for content creation, personal branding, and genuine relationship building in a digital world that’s becoming more automated by the minute.

3. The Rise of the AI Agent Economy

One of the most eye-opening sessions came from Jeremiah Owyang, who introduced what might be the next major disruption in digital marketing and banking: the AI Agent Economy.

We’re entering an era where your next “customer” might not actually be human. Instead, it will be an AI agent acting on their behalf. These agents will research, compare, and even initiate transactions automatically. Imagine someone’s personal AI scanning dozens of bank websites to find the best CD rates or mortgage options - and completing the pre-application process without that person ever visiting your site.

This changes everything.

Marketing to machines will require a new discipline: Know Your Agent (KYA) - the AI-era equivalent of Know Your Customer. Banks will need systems that can authenticate and interact securely with these agents, verifying that each one is acting on behalf of a real, approved customer.

From a strategic perspective, this is a call to modernize your digital infrastructure. Your website, CRM, and data management systems must be designed for machine readability, not just human readability. Search engine optimization will soon mean “Agent Optimization.”

That’s why WSI’s work helping community banks modernize their digital front doors isn’t just about SEO anymore; it’s about future readiness.

4. Human in the Loop: Elevation, Not Elimination

There’s a narrative out there that AI is coming for our jobs. But the best conversations at MAICON flipped that script.

The smartest organizations are using AI not to eliminate roles, but to elevate them. The key phrase here is Human-in-the-Loop (HITL). In banking, this means AI handles the heavy lifting - data analysis, report drafts, compliance checks, while humans apply judgment, empathy, and experience.

This combination doesn’t just protect jobs, it expands your institution’s capacity. You can process more work, serve more customers, and innovate faster without dramatically increasing headcount.

The “Move 37 Moment” isn’t about fear - it’s about creativity. When we let AI take over the routine, humans get to do the remarkable.

5. Secure Data Foundations: The CFUD Model

Finally, none of this matters without a secure foundation. Taylor Radey’s “Expertise Squared” session was a reminder that banks are sitting on a goldmine: decades of internal expertise locked away in documents, call transcripts, and training materials.

She shared a framework called CFUD - Capture, Find, Understand, Do - that I think every bank should consider adopting:

• Capture: Record and transcribe your institution’s collective expertise.
• Find: Use AI-powered enterprise search to locate and surface that knowledge.
• Understand: Build internal, private AI assistants trained exclusively on your bank’s verified information.
• Do: Execute tasks efficiently using that foundation while maintaining human oversight.

When paired with strong verification protocols, CFUD becomes a blueprint for safe, scalable AI adoption in regulated industries. This is where most banks struggle, and where working with an experienced partner who understands both the technology and the regulatory landscape can make all the difference.

WSI helps banks implement this foundation securely, while The LinkedBanker helps individual professionals learn to use that knowledge responsibly and creatively.

The Strategic Shift Ahead

After three days of deep discussion at MAICON, the message couldn’t have been clearer: AI success isn’t about adopting tools - it’s about building systems.

The winners in this next phase of digital transformation will be the banks that create repeatable, verifiable, and secure AI frameworks, systems that scale both efficiency and trust.

If you’re leading a community bank today, your real opportunity isn’t to race the technology. It’s to conduct it, to orchestrate people, data, and AI into a cohesive system that amplifies your strengths and safeguards your reputation.

And if you’re ready to start that journey, that’s where we can help.

At WSI, we work with community banks to design secure, compliant AI systems that actually drive results. Through The LinkedBanker, we empower individual bankers to use AI to elevate their visibility, build authentic relationships, and stay ahead of the curve.

Because the robots aren’t just coming for your customers - they’re coming to help your employees better serve them. The question is: will your bank be ready to meet them? Schedule a call with us today to get started on your bank's AI journey.