Slow down, question the hype and reclaim a voice in workplace AI decisions. Julie Drybrough explores why L&D and HR professionals need space to make sense of fast-moving technology, examine its practical and ethical implications, and shape how AI is adopted rather than simply implementing choices made elsewhere for them.
How much AI information can any of us actually process before “keeping up” starts to feel like drowning? That was one of the questions that prompted Fiona McBride (Fiona McBride Consulting) and Julie Drybrough (Fuchsia Blue) to create AI in Learning: A Sense-Making Day. It’s a one-day gathering in London on 28th September, built around a really simple premise: there is a lot of information about AI in circulation in organisational life and not nearly enough space to actually process it.
A flood of AI tools, vendor claims, research and expert input
Julie and Fiona felt they were watching the same pattern play out across the sector for the past two years, a flood of AI tools, vendor claims, research and expert input, arriving faster than most organisations, or the people inside them, can genuinely absorb.
Julie Drybrough says, “Earlier on this year, we were talking about events and conferences we had been to, where AI dominated the discourse. But neither of us felt what we were hearing helped us answer some of the questions we had, or allowed us to slow down enough to make sense of how the technology might be useful, beyond the hype.”
What does it all mean?
The distinction between what’s on offer and understanding the implication of adoption sits at the centre of the day’s design. Rather than a conventional conference of back-to-back keynotes, the event is structured as more conversational. Morning provocations look at AI through multiple lenses – practical, ethical, ecological, data and security. It’s followed by an Open Space afternoon where attendees shape the agenda around what’s live for them, not a pre-set programme.
The day opens with a panel titled Beyond Adoption: What Wise AI Integration Actually Looks Like, bringing together practitioners already working at the sharp end of AI decisions inside their organisations. The panel is designed as debate rather than showcase, surfacing where good intentions can go wrong, what is working, practically, in organisational life and what people might need to stop doing, not just start.
Underpinning the whole day is a conviction Julie and Fiona share: that L&D and HR professionals have both a right and a responsibility to influence the AI decisions being made around them, not simply implement them once they land.
Time, not tools
Fiona McBride notes, “A lot of people in our field are handed a tool and a deadline. What they’re rarely handed is the space to think it through, the opportunity to slow down and good conversations about what good actually looks like. That’s what this day is for.”
The event is capped at around 50 attendees by design, prioritising genuine dialogue over scale. Confirmed contributors include Jodie Pritchard (Barnardo’s), Dr Ashwin Mehta and others from across the L&D and HR community, with partner organisations IMELD and Mint also involved.
For a sector often caught between AI evangelism and AI anxiety, AI in Learning 2026 is positioning itself as something rarer: a room built for slow thinking about a fast-moving subject, and a chance for practitioners to reclaim some agency in decisions that are, more often than not, currently being made without them.
Julie Drybrough is and Organisational Consultant, Executive Coach/ Supervisor, Writer and Speaker at fuchsiablue
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