When AI Is On Everyone's Dance Card, You Must Dance With AI

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, a dance card was a tiny, decorative booklet used by women at formal balls to keep track of their dance partners for the evening.

The dance card was a high-stakes social tool. A "full card" was a sign of great popularity, while an empty one was every Victorian socialite's nightmare. It also provided a graceful out: if a woman didn't want to dance with a particular suitor, she could simply point to her card and claim it was already full (even if it wasn't). Swiping left: timeless.

In 2026, AI is on everyone's dance card and you must be able to dance with it. It doesn't matter if you have moral objections to AI development, it doesn't matter if you call yourself "not a tech person", it doesn't matter if you think you don't need a chatbot thingamajig: you have to at least know some basics. Willfully ignoring the most disruptive technology that's come along since computers is increasingly social and financial suicide.

Let's explore the three biggest risks of being an AI luddite...through Victorian dance.

The Hygiene Waltz

By the mid-Victorian era, the Waltz was the undisputed star of every ball. It was the most romantic and intimate dance because it was a closed dance: the gentleman actually held the lady’s waist 🍑

Intimacy is key to AI Hygiene. Employees are already dancing with AI everywhere. People are creating accounts in AI tools like ChatGPT for their personal life, they're downloading unsanctioned AI tools to help them with work and play, and they're talking about EVERYTHING to AI.

For all you know, someone at your organization has dumped all of your most sensitive data- client info, budgets, HIPAA records, proprietary codebase, embargoed press releases, employee survey data, etc. etc. etc.- into the free version of ChatGPT to help them do their day job. Here's what could happen to all that Personally Identifiable Information (PII):

• Training Data Incorporation: Your data can become part of the model’s knowledge base, potentially causing the AI to unintentionally reveal sensitive information (e.g., names, SSNs, phone numbers) to other users.
• Data Retention: Even if you delete a chat, the information may persist in backend logs or on third-party cloud infrastructure, meaning it is owned by OpenAI FOREVER.
• Regulatory & Legal Risks: Feeding private data into public models can violate privacy policies and result in legal or compliance penalties for businesses.

Do your people know who they are dancing with?! His name is Shadow AI.​

A Productive Quadrille

The Quadrille was a set dance for four couples arranged in a square. It was less about athletic skill and more about memory and etiquette, especially since this was the primary time for polite conversation (🍑) with your partner and the other couples in your square.

Every business is dancing against competitors and the law of the fittest still reigns supreme: companies that effectively adopt AI will outcompete companies that don't.

The data on effective AI adoption is stark:

• Companies strategically adopting generative AI are seeing an average return of $3.71 for every $1 spent. In financial services, this ROI jumps to 4.2x. (Google Cloud)​
• 58% of small businesses using AI report saving over 20 hours per month per employee. (2025 Empowering Small Business Report)​
• Organizations who effectively use AI (29%) can implement new technology in less than 90 days, whereas laggards take an average of nine months to scale similar pilots. (Boston Consulting Group)​

The topic of polite conversation in every Quadrille is undeniable: companies using AI are going to steal your date by the end of the night.

We Are Reliving Polkamania

In the 1840s, everyone and their mom was doing the polka. The dance became an obsession. It wasn't just a set of steps; it was a lifestyle brand. There were Polka jackets, Polka hats, Polka boots, and even Polka-themed puddings. You know what a polka dot is? It was a marketing ploy.​

Polkamania is happening again: you can't log into LinkedIn without seeing another breathless hot take about AI. Every company is "AI-enabled," sales bros are gushing about how their AI product is "truly transformative," and every executive board is telling their C-suite to "do more AI" (with scant instruction as to how).

AI is everywhere and not having a stance on AI is like not knowing the polka is in 2/4.

The kicker? An increasing number of your potential future clients/customers are going to ask you how you use AI. You are going to be compared against and lose out to companies that use AI, whether you like it or not:

• You might lose on the safety/hygiene angle, "Do you have any protections, policies, or guardrails to keep my data safe from your people who are using Shadow AI?"
• You might lose on the productivity angle, "I can get 10x from your competitor at 25% of the price because they're using AI effectively."
• You might lose on the innovation angle, "The other guy gives me AI-enabled dashboards, more nuanced analytics, and instantaneous results...so I'm going with them."

You simply have to know how to dance with AI.

Today's TL;DR was inspired by an increasing number of requests I've been fielding in just the past month to help organizations be truly AI-fluent. Creating governance charters, presenting AI digital transformation strategies to boards, converting AI-doubters into AI-believers, developing career development maps on AI competencies, and lots and lots of training inquiries on "how do I AI" is the beat that Learn to Scale is increasingly dancing to.

If you'd like to talk about what AI dance steps you need help learning, book some time with me and I'll walk you through the 10-Question AI Fluency Diagnostic I've been using to help organizations identify where they are stumbling with AI.

A TL;DR from the CRO

Not a surprise: my favorite Victorian ballroom dance is the Jolly Dogs Polka.

-Roman Noodles, Chief Ruff Officer

Every once in a while, I throw a hail mary LinkedIn connection to a stranger that I have a professional crush on. I basically say, "Hey, I liked this recent thing you did and I think you're super cool. Would you hang out with me?"

Weirdly, this has been highly effective. Some of my now-favorite collaborators - Adriane, Lauren, Krysta- came into my orbit this way.

I can now add a new one to this list: Ema Roloff. I came across her TikTok (@transformationprincess) while despairing at the content grind it takes to become a TikTok star. I was gripped by how funny and how accurate her change management hot takes were. After watching this clip a bazillion times, I went for it.

She's WONDERFUL! We connected last week and gabbed about content creation, when organizational transformation fails, and messy software. Gracious, funny, and very human.

Meet your heroes. They're probably human.

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My networking strategy is to be a fanboy,

Dan from Learn to Scale​

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​PS. Polka is still sending all the nonnas and paw-paws to the dance floor​