AI Heroes: Jenna Beglin - Episode 18

<p><strong>Beyond Speed and Efficiency - When AI Should Unlock New Possibilities</strong></p><p>When Jenna Beglin evaluates AI tools for consumer research, she&#39;s not asking &quot;can this make us faster?&quot; She&#39;s asking a more fundamental question: &quot;Does this enable us to do something we couldn&#39;t do before?&quot; As a research and insights leader focusing on tech, Jenna has developed a clear philosophy about AI&#39;s role in research—one that challenges the prevailing obsession with productivity gains.</p><p>In this conversation, Jenna shares her perspective on why AI should be additive rather than simply time-saving. She discusses the tension between what she calls &quot;the race to mediocrity&quot;—where AI produces passable but uninspired work—and the genuine breakthroughs that happen when technology unlocks entirely new capabilities. From synthetic respondents to AI-moderated interviews, Jenna walks through her evaluation framework: Is this meaningfully better? Does this give us insights we couldn&#39;t access before?</p><p>This episode offers a practitioner&#39;s framework for thinking about AI adoption—focused not on doing the same things faster, but on genuinely expanding what&#39;s possible in consumer insights work.</p><p><br></p>