PM-Mastery

Catching up with Daniel Hemhauser on AI and the Current Job Market

• Walt Sparling • Season 2 • Episode 77

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I was fortunate to sit down with Daniel Hemhauser recently for a casual catching-up conversation. We touched on the current status of the employment struggles faced by many skilled project managers and the mixed signals we seem to be getting about their future. PMI has said that we’ll need millions more PMs by 2035, but currently the people we talk to are sitting at six, nine, or even eighteen months without work. We get real about what that feels like, why it’s happening across industries, and why even highly skilled project managers and PMO leaders are seeing job posts that demand impossible “everything roles” for entry-level pay.  

We also dig into where movement still exists. Some regions show more hiring energy, especially where construction, distribution, data center build-outs, and AI infrastructure are growing. We share simple, practical tactics like setting targeted job alerts and thinking in terms of project funding and active build cycles, not just job boards. If you’re trying to plan your next move, this is about reading the market with clearer eyes. 

Then we shift to the opportunity hiding in the chaos: AI for project managers. Many people claim they “know AI,” but many are only scratching the surface with basic prompts. We talk about what actually stands out, from building useful workflows to experimenting with AI agents that can take repetitive PM work off your plate, like summaries, status updates, and draft communications. We also cover how to learn faster by having AI create a 30 to 60 day study plan and how to write prompts that force clarity by having the model ask you the right questions first. 

If you’re worried about the future of project management, this conversation is a reminder that fundamentals still matter and new skills can compound quickly. 

Share this episode with a PM friend who needs it, and leave a comment with the toughest hiring trend you’re seeing right now. 

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Welcome Back And Reset

Walt Sparling

And now we're going to host the file the current edition of PM Mastery and today is a casual conversation with Daniel Hemhauser. How are you doing, Daniel? Good, my friend. Thank you for inviting me. Yeah, I know we we did one of these a few months ago and we had some audio issues, so we're starting over. And today it's really more of just a conversation on what's going on.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah. No, I'm looking forward to it. And again, a good chance to catch up with you, my friend. It's been too long. Uh good to see what's going on with you and uh certainly excited about this conversation. Long overdue, much needed, and the conversation I'm having with hundreds, if not thousands, of PMs in the last few months.

Why So Many PMs Are Unemployed

Walt Sparling

Yeah, and I think what we had chatted a little bit about before we started was you know, what's going on in the industry. And uh, I mean, there's there's probably two topics that come to mind for me right now that are big. And one, of course, is AI, and then the other is unemployment. And people struggling. It's like I've seen people that are I've seen some that are not necessarily in the PM world, but just in general. And they're like, all right, I'm coming up on a year without a job, or I'm coming up on six months without a job. And I'm I could not imagine. Uh the last time I lost a job, I found one in 30 days, but I've never been out of work, and I can't imagine being in that position and not being able to find some. And these are you can tell, these are highly skilled people.

Daniel Hemhauser

Oh, yeah, these are people that like you want on their team, man. Uh yeah, I couldn't get more. Like we were just talking about, like, I'm you know, I linked it all the time, and all I do is see I feel like I'm seeing five, I'm looking for a new job, as opposed to one, I got a new job. Um, and again, like you said, many of them are industry experts, well-known people within our profession, and just or just general people, but even half my mentees or coaching clients, they're all six months, nine months, twelve months, eighteen months, and and these people know their stuff, man. Like I would be honored to have some of these people on my team. It's very disconcerting. It's very interesting, and it seems to, at least in my own experience, not uh, you know, uh uh sectioned off just to the US and Canada, seems to be everywhere regardless of what country I talk to.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, and it's interesting because I can't put a finger on, I mean, I've seen a variety of multiple industries, but a lot of these folks, it's like, well, I can't say that they're at the higher age, you know, group because that would stand out, and that's not happening. I've seen young, middle, older. It's like it's all over. It's all over, it's every industry. And you know, some of them I I know were like contract-based, and then they're just now trying to get a new contract. But they're like, you know, we'll take anything. Just give me a job.

Daniel Hemhauser

And that that's what my coaching clients are saying. Well, they're like, you know, ordinary as an example, the one he ordinarily makes about 140, 145,000 a year. He's looking for 60 and $70,000 jobs. One, he can't get them, and two, he's willing to take them, which is half his salary, and he can't feed his family on that. So he's in this weird place right now where he's trying to make that decision because they did offer them a job, and um, he might take it. So it just very stressful, my friend, especially when you have a family to feed.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, and I the thing is, I know there are jobs out there. I mean, I get hit up by recruiters all the time, and most of them I turn down, I it's just not a fit. Yeah, they look at you know, they do their AI scrub of your your uh your profile and they go, Oh, we have this job. And I'm like, I haven't done that in 15 years. And if you saw it on my profile, um, but yeah, I've I think I've talked to one or two, and I'm like, they're out. I mean, they're they're hiring. It's just you know, wherever the these people are, uh there's just gotta be, you know, a tough, a tough market there.

Daniel Hemhauser

And I've yeah, and the thing I I think that the thing that that upsets more people, and I'm talking this is more for people that probably, you know, five, ten, you know, 20 years experience, things like that. We keep seeing the PMI stats. We're gonna need 40 million project managers, we're gonna need 40 million. We we see it everywhere on PMI's website, on LinkedIn. We see all we we we hear it from others, Gartner, all these different organizations, uh, depending on the data source you use. And uh it makes it look like there's 10 jobs for everyone.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, there's not enough PMs.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, exactly. Like there's not enough, like uh, you know, I want to recruit all my friends to become PPMs, and they always ask me about it. But then the reality is exactly like we were just talking about, the reality is again, some areas are a little bit better than others, but it is not easy right now to find a job, regardless uh of your level, especially if if you're well experienced. Again, I thought the same thing they're a little bit older, like me with my gray hair, but no, it's young, old, new, doesn't matter where you are, men, women, it it just doesn't matter.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, it's it's it's tough. And it's it like you said, the the more experienced, because I I thought about that. Like I have a I have a pretty good gig and and you know, I'm trying to just get through retirement. Yeah, but you know, if a if a killer opportunity came up, you know, I'd look into it. But yeah, thinking, you know, they look at my resume and they go, Oh, wow, this is great, tons of experience, all these different areas, and then they meet me and go, Oh my god, he's old. Do we really want to take a risk?

Daniel Hemhauser

I actually had one of those not too long ago, about it 12 months ago, but yeah, you you you can see it in people's face. I don't in my eyes, I want all the people's experience around me, but it definitely happens, although at least in the US, it's illegal, but it certainly happens when.

Walt Sparling

Oh, yeah. In the big companies, it's illegal too. That doesn't mean it doesn't happen in some way. Because you see a lot of um, I I've been in companies where uh the younger folks, and I think it's it is part of it is the energy and their drive to grow. And I think the companies like the younger folks because they have more energy. I think they're also a little more moldable, um, where the older folks, yeah, you know, they have experience, they're like, oh no, listen, I've seen that happen. I've seen five times someone try to do that. Yeah, 55 times, yeah. But uh, you know, the younger, like, yeah, we'll give it a shot. I I love that idea. So there's some, there's there's a benefit to the youth and definitely lower lower pay. Um oh, yeah, absolutely.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, cut the pay in half for sure.

Walt Sparling

But the thing is, we're like we said, it's the people that are looking aren't aren't all old. They're all over.

Daniel Hemhauser

No, absolutely not. No, have half my coaching clients and and probably three quarters of my mentees are uh probably under the age of 30. Um, you know, I'm not knowing their age to sit, but under the age of 30 or right around there. And again, in my mind, just kind of starting to recover out, maybe five years of experience, seven years of experience, maybe ten in some instances, but uh not like me, not with my gray hair.

Walt Sparling

And you know, trying to think back, okay, so what is it? Um, you know, we obviously got a lot of uh turmoil going on in the world. And so I wouldn't say, oh, well, here's here's an example of what AI is doing. It's like, nah, it's not really AI. Maybe there's some AI to it in certain sectors, yeah. But uh with the economy the way it is, it affects, you know, it affects technology, it affects construction, it affects Oh yeah, construction big in New Jersey, New York.

Daniel Hemhauser

A lot of projects are getting shut down because of it.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, so that's uh you wouldn't think that's definitely an aspect, but a lot of these people I see are in other sectors, medical or IT, and uh so it's not it's not any one thing. It's uh mix.

Daniel Hemhauser

No, again, all the all the people I just mentioned before, they're in healthcare, finance, insurance, business, IT, construction, you know, what you name it, it it it it spreads across the gamut. And uh it just seems to be no rhyme. Where I've been working professionally for 27 years, I've seen ups and downs in 2008, all these I've never seen an environment where it felt more unstable, at least in 2008, 2009. It was just bad. It was bad for everyone. Yeah, you see some you know rising quickly, all these numbers uh sound all good, you know, depending on who you talk to or what news channel you watch, the economy is great or the economy is bad, but still it's just very like in New York City. I feel like, and I'm seeing you can't get a job as a project manager anymore. There just aren't any. Um, I look all the time, I work with a bunch of recruiters for for some of my coaching clients, and um there just aren't any jobs. And if it is, you have to be a data programmer, a network engineer, a project manager, you have to be an architect, you also have to have to have three PhDs, 215 certifications, uh, and you need to be able to make coffee. Um you have to, and that's just full time. Exactly, and you have to be in the office all the time, and all of that for 60,000 US, uh, because it's the lowest level job. Um, so it it it just seems to be all over the place. And you know, even you know, the job descriptions are all over the place. It's just I've never seen it like this. I don't I the more people I talk to about it, the more I come up with like I don't think anyone could really pinpoint it. I mean, AI a little bit, but in most instances it's an excuse. Um, but just I don't I don't get it. It it's just not good. It it pains my heart every time I talk to someone that I know should have a job, would do a rock star job if they were on my team for me. Um, and I would hire them in a second, and they just can't get a job. Meanwhile, they're driving Uber, they're delivering pizza. I literally talked to a guy today. This guy's used to make it 200 something grand a year, his wife isn't working, he's driving Uber pizza, and he's helping out uh at his child's school so that the price will uh be decreased because she's out of private school.

Walt Sparling

Wow. Be grateful for what you have.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, exactly. That's that's exactly what I was thinking while I'm off the call, man. And again, this is a guy who's been running and building PMOs at companies the size of Google for his entire career in all kinds of magazines. You know, the the the thought leader in this specific area in IT, uh sorry, in uh the finance project world, at least in the New York City area, can't get work. No one's calling him, no one's answering his phone calls. It's it's crazy.

Where PM Hiring Still Moves

Walt Sparling

Well, I know I I have some uh, and I don't know how many people do this, but if you're on LinkedIn, there are multiple ways where you can set up job uh searches and get warning or not warnings, get alerts. So I know I had someone in one area of Florida that was looking, so I set up an alert specifically for them. Oh, nice, man. And would share that with them. And then recently uh we were actually hiring someone in that area, so I shared that info with my boss, but I changed it to local and I kept it at senior level. And I'm I'm surprised there are a ton of PM shops. So I don't know if you're looking, maybe go to Florida and uh there's still stuff happening.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, also the another area I've because I was doing something similar, the three areas I've probably seen the most are Arizona, Texas, and Florida. Yeah, Texas and Florida they have a lot of work there right now, especially with the data center build-outs, AI, and stuff like that.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, we don't uh I haven't seen much on the data side here yet because I think it's still kind of northeast and west, but I could see Texas. Um, here it's a lot of uh uh commercial, uh more like multi-resident, multi-family. Um there is uh there are distribution centers here, instead of data center, so you know Amazon's got one every three miles.

Daniel Hemhauser

Uh yeah, same same manette is in New Jersey, yeah.

Walt Sparling

So there's still a lot of construction because there's still open land here. And uh I mean I just saw a company recently that's doing uh build-to-rent communities. And I mean huge. That's interesting. And a buddy of mine has been using these for the last three years, and I was I had a cigar with him Monday, and we were talking about he's getting ready to go again. This is third time, and he showed me the pictures of these places. It's like a really nice neighborhood. It's like you know, it's kind of the current ones where the houses are 10 feet apart, you know, they've got five feet. Um, but it's got a pool, it's got four or five bedrooms, it's got uh two-car garage, really nice landscape, gated community, but the entire community is rent. And it's Airbnb. So he goes over there for a weekend with his family, and you know, it's right near Disney. So he'll go over there for three days, you know, 12, 1500 bucks, depending on the amenity, because you can upgrade, do little upgrades, but you're living in a house, and uh the whole community. I mean, he showed me an aerial view. This this thing like literally every house there is oh, it had like 200 houses, and he goes, There's three other communities right next door.

Daniel Hemhauser

Wow. I mean, I guess that makes sense. Obviously, people are are doing that, but especially in an environment like Florida where you got Disney Universal, you have a lot of cool places to call that. I don't know if that would work in New Jersey

AI Hype Versus Real Capability

Daniel Hemhauser

too much.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, I mean, most of those when they buy something, they want to come down here. So nice. So, what else is uh let's go AI? We haven't said much on that, but uh I know we chatted a little bit. You're doing some pretty cool stuff with AI. Uh I'm still thinking of this.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, yeah, AI is uh interesting. It's one of those things where even my eight-year-old knows what it is, and not just the the term. She actually understands what it is, she doesn't have to program it, but she understands what it is and what it does and what it could be. Um, and again, no matter you look on the news, you look on the internet, you talk to people, you look on LinkedIn. It's A AI is everything, right? It feels like everyone knows AI except me. Um, but then I talk to people, I come to even talk to executives all the time, business owners, people getting ready to build out, or uh, uh uh, you know, RFP, like a uh major AI project. I kind of find out no one actually knows anything about AI. I mean, there are there are a few. Um, but at the end of the day, we we are kind of like when we were coming up, when the internet became a thing, when dial-up was so big, and then we had DSL and DS3s and all these uh different levels of internet. Um, it it feels just like that again, where it's so big and so much and it's everywhere, but still, there's a major opportunity, especially for project managers, to step up to the plate. Because when I say added people, everyone says they that they understand it, but then I come to find out they it's they're talking about Chat GPT and they they're using it like Google. They're not programming idiotic AI, they're not building workflows, uh, they're not you know orchestrating all these things together, not making output. It's very, you know, I give you a prompt, it gives me something back, it's you know, back and forth. They're not building pure systems. And uh still today, I had the one thing, and it kind of ties back into the the other topic that we're talking about. The one thing I am seeing, there are more and more uh um project manager jobs that are looking specifically not as a primary set of skills, but as a secondary set of skills for building agionic systems andor uh not the system building themselves, but helping to build them, um, and or managing projects for agionic AI, uh projects or platforms or clients or work like that. So, and I am noticing also that the pay is 40,000, 60, 80,000 more, but they can't seem to fill any of the jobs because not that many. I told the recruiter yesterday, he's like, I would pay $250,000 right now if you could give me some. I don't care if they're good. I I need to put someone in front of the client. Um, but then you turn around and there aren't that many people. But no, AI is great from in my own work. Like we talked about earlier. I am not an AI master, I'm learning my way like everyone else, but I just built this really cool uh 33-agent system that um, oh man, the things that I could it's like having a team of 33 people that do 33 different things, you don't have to pay them, and they work all day long as long as your laptop or or your SaaS platform's on. And uh it's amazing, and it just gives me so much excitement about project management because of what it could be now, like all that stuff we have to do at work, emails, the status updates, and slide decks, and take that off my plate, please. And if it could do up to 80 or even half, you know, 25, um, depending on the the data source you look at. I think that's please take it off my

Agents That Remove Busywork

Daniel Hemhauser

plate.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, I think the agents are are the big thing right now, and that's and I know that's the big talk, but really yeah when I first started, I was you know focused on prompting, and then I started making my own GPTs, and I was pretty excited about that. And then I started making my own projects where I'd have, you know, I have a personal health coach and I have a personal uh uh oh my god, I've got like three different items. One is health, one is well, one is uh well, the health one focuses on three different areas supplements, nutrition, exercise. Oh, cool. And of course, when you with uh I use chat primarily, and it stores all your information. So like when you do get your new blood work, you you just take a snap a picture of it with your phone and say, Hey, here's my latest blood work, compare it with my last one. And it's so funny. It gives you a summary and it says, Hey, your your uh your A1C is high, you might want to consider this. The last time I went to the doctor, I took a summary that I had created and I said, Hey, what kind of you know, based on all the material I've given you and what I'm doing for exercise or or not doing and what I'm doing for supplements and nutrition, what kind of questions should I ask the doctor?

unknown

Sure.

Walt Sparling

So boom, and they gave me a list of questions. And so I I had it all printed out and I gave it her, and she was like, Wow, these are some interesting questions you're asking.

Daniel Hemhauser

I know, all of a sudden it makes everyone super smart, but like look how cool that was. Something simple, personal for you or or your family, and uh like look at the power that was just put into your hand. So, again, hopefully, you know, if it's an emergency, you go see a doctor, but your normal stuff. Look how cool that is, man. And the power of having information at your hand and and and being more compared, you know, put all that stuff together, give you some and give you good doctors always like, Do you have any questions? I have no questions because I'm not a doctor, I don't know what to ask. Uh, you tell me something's wrong, I try to fix it. But that kind of puts you in a in a better, more prepared state. So you you're you know, you're you're just thinking better, so you could ask more questions for your own health, especially as we're getting older.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, and the thing is like to me, the Asians are gonna be the next step, but I'm still like mastering the the prompts, and I've customized my my chat to work and talk like me. In fact, I've I've given it a name and I introduce her to people, and and she's like, Oh, hey, I'm Walt AI of System, and they're like, How'd you do that? But the thing is, like, learning, like people say, I don't know how to write a prompt. Well, you know what? Just tell AI you don't know how to write exactly. Just it'll write it for you.

Daniel Hemhauser

Use the tool to develop the tool. When other world have we been in that we've been able to do that? No, previously I had to pay $20,000 for a course to teach me that. Now I can pay $20 a month and have the tool teach me how to do it.

Walt Sparling

Yep. Yeah, and that's another topic I've heard this a lot is uh people talking about pick a topic that you want to learn and tell ChatGBT or Gemini or whatever you're using to teach, help you learn that topic. I want to learn this topic. How do I go about it? What and I want to learn it in 60 days, and uh give me links, give me resources, and give me a study plan on how I can go about this. And uh I mean, I've I've used it for I have uh usually way too many goals every year.

Daniel Hemhauser

Oh, that's a slimming doubt. It tells now my my aunt tells me, dude, too much. You gotta like, you know, now we're down to like two things.

Walt Sparling

Yeah. So I I just put in, I know it was a few months ago, I said, all right, we've been working on my goals for the last six months and you know, changing, I've been updating what's going on. I said, but now I'm looking to go in this direction. What do you recommend I do about the goals that I already have? Yeah. And it was like, all right, are you gonna be doing well? Like one was uh I was going for my scrum master. I was about halfway through the course. And uh it was like, are you are you planning on uh interviewing for a scrum master position? No, I was just doing it for experience so I could talk to people about it. All right, scratch that. And then it started going down through and why are you doing this one? Why are you doing this one? Why are you doing this one? And it's like, all right, based on what you're talking about and your time frames, you need to focus on this one, this one, in this order. And would you like me to create a daily schedule? Yeah, go for it.

Daniel Hemhauser

I for someone who's that me, that my mind is all over the place all the time. Um, it's nice to, you know, again, I work from home all the time, so it's nice to have, I don't want to say really a reason to voice, but someone who's you know thinking a little bit more logically sometimes because like you said, you have 30 things you want to do, six months you put to work in, now you want to do something else. Did I waste my time? Should I continue? And now, even if it's you know, useful make the decision, at least it gives you some ideas and prompts and gives you questions that you may not even have considered to help make the best decision.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, and the cool thing is that you can tell it how direct, how humorous, how serious, all of that you can you can build

Prompts That Ask Better Questions

Walt Sparling

that into your configuration, and then and I'll my wife I taught her how to do a little bit of it, and now it'll come back to her and say, So I'm gonna give this to you in a very forward, blah, blah, blah, you know, way. And she's like, Why does it always say that? I said, Because you have it built into your prompt, so it's it's letting you know that that's how it's gonna answer you. Um, but that's so funny, man.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, all of mine yell at me, and I got I was using a chat scpt like a a year or so ago, and I couldn't stand anymore. Like, no matter what I said to it, I was the best thing in the world. Oh, yeah. Hey, I'm gonna invest some money, two two hundred dollars in this stock. Oh, yes, uh, you'll make four million dollars next week. I'm like, dude, no, I won't. And that I finally got a prompt very long, but that just gives it to me long in a nice way. It doesn't, you know, yell at me. Something the one does. Um, all it does is yell at me on purpose. Um, but yeah, it it's so like again, imagine this stuff when we were younger, man. Like going to the moon was like the I mean, not the that one, but going to the moon is the coolest thing, and we're gonna have space cars by this time. You don't have space cars, but now we have computers that that literally do the work of a thousand people in two seconds and could really make a positive impact on our lives, on our profession, uh, on the people around us, on medical, like so many different things, as long as of course it's on the car rails that as long as we don't get all terminators

Picking AI Tools Without Overload

Daniel Hemhauser

out of it.

Walt Sparling

Exactly. And it's it's so interesting. You're talking about, I think, during this and and earlier about how people use it like Google. And I and you know, I I hate these ads where they go, and I think it's course of and some other ones where they go.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, coursive. That's when I say all this.

Walt Sparling

You know, every other thing. Are you 40 years old and are you still using for $20 you can get all these things? Yeah. And I I went through not because of my age, but I I was looking for something that was structured. And so I went through it for a couple months and I went through three of the the base courses, and of course, you know, after that, then you know they double the price and and all that. And I said, Okay, I got the key things I wanted. From here now, I can I can just pick and choose. I'll develop, you know, because they were gonna show me 15 different ones. And I'm like, I don't I don't need to use 15 different ones. I believe that's one or two, master, pick a primary, and then if you need some specialty stuff, use another. But if you get two spread, I mean, could you could always say, well, now that I'm going to this company, they only use Gemini. Okay, well, yeah, go into Gemini, teach me all the critical things I need to know about how to use you, you know.

Daniel Hemhauser

No, and that's one of the I'm I'm glad you actually brought that up because that's another thing. Kind of going back into there's so much AI, you know, the it's everywhere, and not many people. There's 265 new tools coming out every hour. You don't know which one to use. You know, ChatGTPT was the king a year ago. Now everyone uses Claude or Gemini or Perplexity or whichever one one you know flavor you have, and they all do different things well. Some do things better than others, but each month it feels like it's changing. So even when I talk to my client, like, dude, learn the basics, learn, understand how it works, how you could use it effectively, and just like anything else, that's 90, 80, 90 percent of it. You learn a tool, grab on the tool and teach yourself using the tool. And I don't understand how it works.

Walt Sparling

That was the point I was gonna try to try to make there, is that you know, you say, or not you, but I mean in general, people say, Oh, and these these people trying to sell courses. Well, they're using it like Google. And I'm like, Yeah, but they're getting blown away with the results. And then when you they start telling you, sharing with you, and then you go, Oh, well, yeah, but have you tried this? Oh, you can do that, yeah.

Daniel Hemhauser

And they're like, Well, what else can I do? Sounds about right. Yep, yeah. That's that's almost every conversation I have with anyone about AI, especially people that know a little bit more about me than I do.

Walt Sparling

I did a present, and I think I told you this last time we talked, is I did a presentation for a mastermind group, and that's where I introduced my AI. And they all used AI to some extent. There was one or two that didn't. I mean, they they played with it, they like asked it a question or whatever, but it was too complicated. So I did a whole thing on prompting and and different ones, perplexity and Gemini and chat. And this one guy was a writer, and he was like, you know, I've written stuff in the past, but sometimes I get brain blocked, or I want to go use some of my old material. And I go, okay, so I said, get Chat GPT, set up a project, call it your writing project, take some of your old articles or or material that you written, throw it in there, and then start asking for you know input from the AI. And and here's some prompt stuff you can do. He texted me at like 11:30 that night. Oh my god, dude, this is so cool.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, I I'd love to hear that because again, for people that aren't 20 or 12, um, for like when we first started out, we barely had computers or the internet, but just this the top technology itself, but then showing someone, just the the whole thing of showing someone I just seen their face light up like a little kid, man. But it is cool. Like all of a sudden everyone has a book now, everyone has a podcast. Three-quarters of podcasts I see are are fake video ones generated by AI. And it it's just it enables so many people to do so many things, of course, within the constraints of certain things, but it it the power of it, man, could literally change like the world that we live in around us personally, professionally, and everyone around us, but just such a cool opportunity. And I'm I'm glad that I live this long, not that I'm not old, but that I lived this long, and I'm getting to see my kids grow up in this environment where like they literally have anything. I mean, I thought I had everything at my fingertips. They had everything at their fingertips. And by the time you know my little nine-year-old's 20 years old, dude, it's it's gonna be insane out there, man. Cars will probably driving themselves 100%. Uh AI will be running everything, and and you get you it just frees you to do so many things. And again, to build some agents, like going a little bit farther, building agents. I could start a business, run a business. You can have a whole marketing team, you could have a con uh, it's insane. You could have a whole production company writing books all day. Like, it's amazing what you could do with it.

Walt Sparling

I

Automating Processes Inside Big Companies

Walt Sparling

had a I had so I had a like I said, I had a cigar with a buddy of mine the other night. We were working on some business stuff for our mastermind, and and I was like, So what are you working on? And he he has uh he's building an AI team, but he also he's kind of the head of change management for a financial institution. And he's built a team and he he just he called me, he's like, Listen, I gotta hire a bunch of PMs. I need to pick your brain. And uh so we went through all the stuff and then he he presented that night what he what his plan is. But he was saying at work, he's like considered like the guru. Like he's he's found out a lot of people are are uh geeking around with uh co-pilot. So he goes, All right, the whole house, everything's three is uh Microsoft based. So he started learning all that, and then his team is like, all right, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna start taking uh processes that we manually do, and every week we're gonna pick a process and we're gonna meet uh one day a week and we're gonna go through how do we automate this through AI. So they've done they did a couple of them and it spread, and now people are coming to him and go, hey, listen, we got this, this, and this.

Daniel Hemhauser

Oh, that's what happens though. That's so cool. I'd love to hear stories like that, man.

Walt Sparling

And now he's like they're they're asking him to come in and speak with uh, I mean, he's a he's a director level, but they're like people above him. They're saying, We want you to come to one of our meetings and talk to us about it.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, we got to keep this guy around. Can you come show us how to do that? That's such a cool story, man. But again, you know, uh uh any uh anyone at any age could like that. There's there's no agers tricks around here. Anyone at any age could do this stuff, man. And and you know, it doesn't take years to learn it. I seven days, you could become pretty proficient at it. You may not be a master, but you'll be good enough um to stand with with most people. But you give it 30, 60, 90 days, you can do some really cool stuff, man. You know, again, tune it to your life, start a business, tune it to your professional life.

Walt Sparling

I mean, you could even go and get it, get an AI that you've heard about or your friends use, and just say, okay, yeah, I want to learn how to maximize the use of AI. This is what I do, this is what I want to use it for, and I'd like to learn it in 30 days. Develop a plan. Literally, you just tell AI.

Daniel Hemhauser

Almost the same prompts I used when I first started out, something just like that for my personal life and and for project manager, and then some of the things I was working on for my business prompts exactly like that, give you a nice day-by-day plan, what you should do, what resources you need, and it, you know, you get better at it, and it monitors it you give it input, and it just it's like having a and the thing is, you know, you know, like you got all these people that are selling these training programs, you know, buy the book.

Walt Sparling

Here's I'll give you this whole program. It's like, no, what you need is their initial prompt that they used, and then just take that and put in what you do and what you want to learn, and then all the rest of it, you know, like uh you know, I've I learned what I thought was so cool is you instead of writing a prompt that says give me an answer, you say, I want an answer about this, but I'm not exactly sure how to ask it. So you give me you ask me questions as many as you think are necessary to you feel that you can deliver an answer that's 95% of what I'm looking for.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, just that restructure will change your life uh if you're trying to learn this and give you real answers based on you more specifically, not some general website bull crap.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, I rewrote our uh HR uh at the end of the year, you do reviews, self-reviews, and they they had this prompt, it was pretty basic, and they said copy and paste everything we had you fill out over here into this. And I'm like, okay, redundant work. All right. So then I'm reading it and I'm going, This is oh, this is kind of a pain. And some people don't like to do the work twice, which I mean, I'm not a so I said I rewrote the prompt and I just took everything that they had asked, and then I said, Hey, ask me questions, give me feedback, and do not move on to the next question until I tell you I'm you know next.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yes, that's the other thing, man. Yeah, just give it those little tiny guardrails makes all the difference.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, it's it's it's phenomenal.

Future Proofing A PM Career With AI

Walt Sparling

So, okay, so we've talked about AI, we've talked about the sad world of unemployment. Oh god. What else? Any other any other hot topics, weather?

Daniel Hemhauser

Uh I mean the the old I mean kind of combining those two things together. Uh uh, I just again something that obviously everyone talks about. You see, all over social media again, uh again, trying to keep it to the same new topics is you know, actually, I mean we cover, I was gonna say like AI, like you know, taking people's jobs and stuff like that, more specifically, more more than the generic talk that we were having. But yeah, man, just at the end of the day, uh still all the people I talked to, half of them are unemployed, half of them are about to be unemployed. It's just insane. But the the whole AI part of it, man, at the end of the the day, like you have to know how to use this stuff, man. Like you have to learn how to use this stuff, man. Um, because again, you know, 2026 and beyond, I I feel like I say this all the time. I've talked to many others that kind of agree, um, or agree uh partly or mostly. Um this is a different time for for our profession, man. And uh as more and more of this stuff picks up and takes over, you know, there's I don't want to get into the human center stuff, but the there's a massive opportunity for you to really stand out and become marketable. Yes, the the market's not great in many instances, hopefully it gets better sooner or later. But if you really want to stand out in the future, man, you gotta kind of combine these great PM skills with a lot of this stuff because it will really make you truly stand out. Again, the evidence is that fifty, sixty thousand dollars uh uh uh more and um you know the guy was ultimately just gonna be doing the same job, except his title at AI in it wasn't really doing anything for you how to use a few tools, but no man, it's just man, 26 years, I've I've never seen our industry like this, man. It's just you don't know which way's up.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, it's like you know, back in the day, you know, everyone was using well when it I I was around when Lotus and WordPerfect.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, same. That was the Microsoft wasn't even a thing yet. Lotus is what everyone used, especially for email.

Walt Sparling

And uh when Excel came and then Word and then PowerPoint, and then it was like Office, you know, combined. Yeah, it was like, okay, you know, what do you know about Microsoft Office or what do you know about Excel? And I'm like, oh, I use I oh I'm and I've heard people say, Oh, I'm great in it. And then you hire them, and and they're like, I'm like, you know how to open it and you know how to exactly yeah, you're old. And I'm like, but you really don't know squat. And uh it's the same thing now. It's like, well, okay, Chat GPT or any AI app, you know, program, you know, whether it be Gemini or Croc or Chat GPT, it's like, oh yeah, I use it all the time. Like, oh, cool. And then you get them in, it's like, all right, I want you to go do something, I want you to use chat to do that. And they're like, oh, I I mean, I I don't know. Uh how do you how do you do that?

Daniel Hemhauser

No, you nabbed, man, because it is like that. And the one, although I am older and I wish I was, you know, 18 years old again, uh the I am glad that I have that experience of going through like the internet, like you said, you know, Microsoft becoming a thing, different iterations of a similar thing happening, not as big as AI by any stretch of the imagination, but just having the experience of dealing with all these different technologies and things happening just in general at work, let alone the profession you're in, the companies that you work for. But oddly enough, talking about what one of my first first jobs at a uh uh uh a manager, he used to call this the ribbon test, and I had no idea what he was talking about. It wasn't until after me he hired the next person. And when they said, I know uh I know uh Word, I know Excel, he would sit down with them and make them demonstrate using all the tools on the ribbon, like how to do you know, insert stuff, how to uh set the formatting up, not just manually doing it, but how do you set it up as a template, uh, you know, creating different spots and sizes and things like that. So it's stuck in there and just going on and on and on to data and creating tables and stuff like that. And if you did good enough, man, it was a really good paying job at the time. So um, but yeah, like we're just in a weird place, man. But the only thing I can say is learn some AI stuff, people. I don't care what tool it is, learn the basics. There's a there's a plethora of resources, you don't even have to pay for most of this stuff, but get yourself a tool. What like like Walt said, there's always one that I I prefer to use nowadays, it's Claude. I used to use Chat TPT, but I still use Chat TPT for some things just because I kind of you know put them against each other sometimes to come up with the best output. But Claude Code is so cool, man.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, the coding I've I've heard a lot. And that's the thing is if you're in a certain area, you you can you can look at and say, which app is best for the primary focus that I have. Yes. Then you can experiment with the other. You know, I don't, I don't, I don't code, uh, don't uh I don't do a lot of graphics, I do minimal graphics. It's usually for me it's brainstorming and exactly uh brainstorming project stuff. So that I can do in ChatGPT very easily.

Daniel Hemhauser

Oh, yeah, that's all Chat GPT all day long.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, so and I I'd done a little bit in Gemini, uh like uh the what is it, uh Nana Banana or whatever the heck it's called. Oh yeah, nano the names that these people come up with, man. Um, but yeah, so yeah, get learn some AI. Learn some AI for sure. And you don't need to take a $20 a month course, but that's that's a good starting point. But uh if you get a tool and you want to go to the code, yeah.

Daniel Hemhauser

At least that introduce you know, that I did look at it for a second. At least it introduces you to the different tools and what they each could do, even though if it's only 15, 20, you know, a half hour long. At least it gives you an introduction so you could walk away better understanding. All right, I know I'm never gonna use these, but these kind of make sense for me.

Walt Sparling

And don't just take the course, play experiment.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yes, yeah, you get a free version of all the tools. You miss their seven days.

Walt Sparling

Yeah, definitely use it.

Daniel Hemhauser

Notion, click up all of them, you get a free version of it for a while.

Walt Sparling

All right.

Closing And Next Episode Ideas

Walt Sparling

Well, I think we're gonna call it here. This is a great time. We always always have good conversations. I know, man.

Daniel Hemhauser

I could talk to you forever. You're you're just one of those people that I know. I can just talk to you about a million different things, man.

Walt Sparling

Well, we'll get you we'll get you back on air again. Maybe we can do some uh some panel type discussions.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yes, that is what I'm looking for right now. I keep talking to everyone. I'm like, why don't we all get together? Let's do four or five people, six people. We'll we'll figure it out. But yes, I would I would love to do that with you, my friend.

Walt Sparling

Awesome. I will keep that in mind. There's one that I've been talking about for over a year that I want to do, and it's uh PM spouses, where we actually interview the spouses for PS.

Daniel Hemhauser

Yeah, I think we might have talked about this last time when we were talking about the podcast. Absolutely, hell yes, I'm in. I am in on that a thousand percent, man. Well, your spouse has to be in. Oh, yeah. No, because I can just tell you just you know, not to bring up LinkedIn, but one of my posts that does the not anymore, others do better, but this one, every time I put it out like once every three months about you know being what it's like being married to a project manager, my wife we got to not an argument, but like a little confrontation, and that post came from there, and it's the one that thousands of people yes me to. I'm married to a PM and I'm a PM. Like, how do you think that goes? And uh just from that one piece of data, it would be a rock star hit, man.

Walt Sparling

Well, I need to I need to push that. It's I I I have it in my list of topics I want to do, and I keep oh, I want to do this and I'll I'll knock it down a notch. But that is not I need to I need to get that one going.

Daniel Hemhauser

Oh, that could be a whole podcast by itself, man. Oh, yeah. I actually thought of that a while back. But then my wife's like, I'm not doing that. I'll do one, but I'm not doing that.

Walt Sparling

All right. Well, you enjoy the rest of your evening, sir. And uh my friend, we're good catching up with you. Sounds good. All right, thanks.

Intro/Outro

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