It’s that time when all the dictionaries announce their Words Of The Year.

The Oxford English Dictionary went for the TikTok popularised ‘rizz’, short for charisma. As I understand it, you can rizz someone up i.e. charm them/chat them up, and be either full of, or devoid of, rizz.

(My teenage daughter wanted to rip her ears off when I sense checked that with her. Apparently I lack rizz ???? )

Collins Dictionary, however, went for the more obvious ‘artificial intelligence’.

And at the other end of the spectrum, Miriam Webster plumped for ‘authentic’.

And these two choices seem to sum up what we’re trying to get our heads around right now.

The tug-of-war between the efficiencies of AI and our need for real, human connection.

In a world of deepfakes, Instagram filters and social media bots, it’s getting harder than ever to know who – or what – we’re dealing with. And who – or what – to trust.

Google announced over the summer they’re beta testing a tool for watermarking and identifying AI-generated content.

I wonder whether soon we’ll need a ‘human watermark’ instead, as the balance shifts towards AI-created content…

I’ll leave you with a cautionary AI tale told to me by a client recently.

One of their colleagues was solely using Outlook email prompts like ‘Great, thanks!’ and ‘Awesome!’ to reply to their manager’s emails.

The manager found out and was furious.

Not because the replies were rude or inappropriate. But because the sender hadn’t been truthful. Hadn’t respected her enough to give her a personalised reply.

Hadn’t treated her like a human.

Ouch.

I’m not a big one for predictions (the pandemic taught us that much), but I have no doubt we’ll be talking even more about authenticity and trust next year.

Where AI might boost your personal brand, your organisational brand, your communication and your relationships – and where it might do untold damage.

For now, I’m going to concentrate on finding my rizz, which sounds a whole lot easier.