Sidecar Blog

Live from digitalNow 2025: Inside the Association Evolution | [Sidecar Sync Episode 108]

Written by Mallory Mejias | Nov 13, 2025 2:27:19 PM

Summary:

Live from digitalNow 2025 in Chicago, this special edition of Sidecar Sync brings together voices from across the association world, sharing real-life examples of AI implementation, leadership innovation, and strategic transformation. Mallory Mejias speaks with leaders from the American Paint Horse Association, the Missouri State Teachers Association, AGRiP, and more to uncover how associations are moving from ideation to execution with AI. Whether it’s slashing support calls with AI chatbots or overhauling strategic planning using the St. Louis Arch as a metaphor, this episode is packed with inspiration, practical takeaways, and a healthy dose of in-person energy.
Timestamps:

00:00 - Welcome from digitalNow 2025!
02:29 - Chrissy Bagby
06:40 - George Boyle
09:21 - David Dellin
13:48 - Matt Appenzeller
17:11 - Bruce Moe
20:24 - Ann Gergen
25:28 - Wrapping Up: Reflections from digitalNow 2025

 

 

👥Provide comprehensive AI education for your team

https://learn.sidecar.ai/teams

📅 Find out more digitalNow 2026:

https://digitalnow.sidecar.ai/digitalnow2026

🤖 Join the AI Mastermind:

https://sidecar.ai/association-ai-mas...

🔎 Check out Sidecar's AI Learning Hub and get your Association AI Professional (AAiP) certification:

https://learn.sidecar.ai/

📕 Download ‘Ascend 3rd Edition: Unlocking the Power of AI for Associations’ for FREE

https://sidecar.ai/ai

🛠 AI Tools and Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

Betty ➔ https://bettybot.ai

Sidecar AI Learning Hub ➔ https://learn.sidecar.ai

👍 Please Like & Subscribe!

https://www.linkedin.com/company/sidecar-global

https://twitter.com/sidecarglobal

https://www.youtube.com/@SidecarSync

Follow Sidecar on LinkedIn

⚙️ Other Resources from Sidecar: 

More about Your Hosts:

Amith Nagarajan is the Chairman of Blue Cypress 🔗 https://BlueCypress.io, a family of purpose-driven companies and proud practitioners of Conscious Capitalism. The Blue Cypress companies focus on helping associations, non-profits, and other purpose-driven organizations achieve long-term success. Amith is also an active early-stage investor in B2B SaaS companies. He’s had the good fortune of nearly three decades of success as an entrepreneur and enjoys helping others in their journey.

📣 Follow Amith on LinkedIn:
https://linkedin.com/amithnagarajan

Mallory Mejias is passionate about creating opportunities for association professionals to learn, grow, and better serve their members using artificial intelligence. She enjoys blending creativity and innovation to produce fresh, meaningful content for the association space.

📣 Follow Mallory on Linkedin:
https://linkedin.com/mallorymejias

Read the Transcript

🤖 Please note this transcript was generated using (you guessed it) AI, so please excuse any errors 🤖

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Sidecar Sync Podcast, your home for all things innovation, artificial intelligence and associations.

[00:00:14] Greetings, and welcome to the Sidecar Sync, your Home for content at the intersection of all things artificial intelligence and the world of associations. My name is Amith Nagarajan and my name is Mallory Mejias and we are your host today. Live at digitalNow 2025 here in Chicago. It is awesome. How you doing, Mallory?

[00:00:34] I'm doing really well. We've had such a great morning so far. Amith, you kicked us off with the event. We had Marcus Sheridan, we had Bryan Kelly, we had Conor and Finn Grennan, and then now we're in the breakout session mode. I would encourage you all, if you're listening, audio only to head straight to YouTube.

[00:00:50] And watch us because we're actually at digital now live right now. Maybe you can hear the hubbub in the background. Yep. It's been incredible so far. Far. These are real people. All the people in the background. These are real, not AI [00:01:00] generated take. I am stoked, Mallory. This is so cool. It's, it's fun recording this in person.

[00:01:05] It is so fun having nearly 300 people here at digitalNow. This is the biggest digital now ever. Yep. Um, so much in the way of great conversation. People are really jazzed about ai, uh, AI agents, and I have to say that my favorite speaker so far was 16-year-old. Spin Gran. He was so awesome as a 16-year-old.

[00:01:25] So composed my mind. Yeah. The whole time he was presenting, I was just smiling and thinking, what is this kid gonna do in the future? Because he was so poised, he didn't seem nervous at all. It was truly impressive. Yeah. I told him if he ever needs an internship, you know, give us ring. He has a place. Yeah.

[00:01:40] Uh, the Blue Cypress Family of company for sure. So Finn and Conor, if you're listening, thank you very much and to all of our keynotes. Thus far here at Digital now in the morning of day one on November 3rd, and those that are speaking the next two days, we appreciate you greatly and to our attendees, we do as well.

[00:01:56] This is an awesome event because of you and, uh, we're just having some cool [00:02:00] conversations. I mean, people are doing stuff this year, Mallory, compared to last year. It's a completely different game. I feel like it's the same with Ascend third edition. We went so much from AI as an abstract AI as a concept to, yeah.

[00:02:11] Things that we're actually executing projects that we're implementing with ai. Yeah, and it's been really cool to see thus far for this episode. I'm actually going to be talking to association leaders at this event and asking them what they're doing with ai, what tips they might have for strategy. So everybody, thanks for tuning in.

[00:02:27] We've got a really good episode lined up for you. Hello everybody. I am here with Chrissy Bagby. Chrissy, what organization are you with? I am with the American Association of Veterinary State Boards. That is a long one. Chrissy and I were having a great conversation over lunch just now about strategy and particularly the St.

[00:02:46] Louis Arch as kind of a roadmap for strategy and associations. I was hoping you could talk a little bit about that. Sure. Yeah. Um, well, what we found our ourself in a situation of is we were needing greater strategic and operational alignment. [00:03:00] And so whereas strategy typically is from the top down, it starts with the board, goes with their executive leadership.

[00:03:06] Yep. There's senior management and then hits, um, the staff. Yes. What we did is we, we, we sort of reversed that. Okay. Um, in the past year at the American Association of Veterinary State Boards, I likened it to the arch, the St. Louis Arch. So if you're building an arch, if you start with one side and you just start building one side, you're gonna come to a point that you can't build anywhere.

[00:03:27] You can't build anywhere. You know, I've never thought about that, but okay. True. I get you. It's not gonna make any, it's, it's not gonna be structurally sound. Right. So what we did is, the way they built the arch in St. Louis is they built both sides in tandem and met in the middle. Okay? So how that applies to what we did in strategy.

[00:03:47] Is where our board of directors developed a strategy map. Mm-hmm. Our staff developed an operational map as a counter document to it as Okay opinion document to our [00:04:00] strategy map. So that's the foundation of the two sides. That's the foundation of the two sides. Okay. And that operational map is our staff saying these are the operational things that we need to have happen to make the strategy a reality.

[00:04:12] Okay. So then we started building on top of that. Okay. So the next layer was our staff built vision plan. So each of our departments and all of our executive and senior leadership created vision plans for business plans. Yep. Where they said, this is what we think is important to do this year. Mm-hmm.

[00:04:32] Based on their knowledge operationally. Right. And then we gave them what the board had put together in their strategy map, and they had the operational map. And then they connected the two and they said, okay, we're gonna align our vision to the strategy in this way and to our operational map in this way.

[00:04:50] And then we connected them at the top with a scope of work that combined the work that the board had done with the work staff had done. Yep. So that even [00:05:00] at the frontline staff level, they see how what they're doing impacts strategy. Yes. Because they can literally see their words. In our scope of work for our strategic.

[00:05:14] Yep. Ah, I, I, that's such a great, did you come up with this, with the idea? There were definitely a few of us involved. Yes. I, I, I sort of started the process with the vision plans and then, um, our executive team, our senior team, got involved with different ideas that we peppered in. Um, we worked with a consultant to, who helped us sort of say, Hey, how about we flip the whole thing?

[00:05:35] So it took a lot of minds, a lot of brain power. Jim Penrod, our CEO. Yes. Well, he was instrumental in this. Because you also have to have the board of directors and the CEO for sure on board to say, yo, let's give this a shot. Yeah. Right. To have that entrepreneurial spirit Yes. To say, let's try this in a different way than we have before and let's see if it hits.

[00:05:56] Yes. We talk about that a lot too. And uh, and ascend as [00:06:00] well. Like you have to have top-down leadership, but you've gotta have that bottom up buy-in for staff. Or basically it just feels very disconnected, right? Yeah. Your frontline workers are gonna say, what is my day to day? What does this have to do with what the board is proposing?

[00:06:12] So I feel like this is just a practical way to approach like new projects or AI and staff really delivered. Yeah. And one, one of the great things I'm so proud of is now that we are. A year into this. Yep. And I get to report back to the board all the great things we did. Um, it really shines a spotlight on the staff Yes.

[00:06:31] That they were able to accomplish, which is really exciting for me to be able to present that message to our world. Well, that's beautiful. Thank you for sharing with our audience, Chrissy. Thank you for giving me the opportunity. I appreciate it. Alright. I am joined by George Boyle from Illinois CPA Society.

[00:06:45] How are you doing today? I'm doing well, Mallory. How are you? You know, I'm doing really well. First day of digital now. I feel like we had a good few sessions this morning. Any standouts for you in terms of a favorite session? Well, really the session that looked at [00:07:00] how Gen Z and the future generations are looking at AI and what they're doing with it compared to what Gen X and some of our, um.

[00:07:11] Older executives for sure think of ai. Yep. It was really eye, really eye-opening. Yeah, a hundred percent. When you, you came to digital now last year? Yes. It, yes. Coming into this year, was there a specific topic you wanted to learn about a, a challenge that you're trying to overcome as an organization? Like what are you hoping to get out of the event this year?

[00:07:30] Well, the biggest thing is, uh, looking beyond just, oh, let's implement an ai. Let's implement a chat bot for our members. Let's. Let's, um, create an agent for something. Yes, we wanna look at the bigger picture of how we can benefit for sure with AI and, um, our member base is wide ranging in age, so getting the different perspectives on how the different generations use AI and look at AI really helps us [00:08:00] as we look at the future, at the big picture in the future.

[00:08:02] I love it. And you all are in the AI Learning Hub, is that right? The sidecars AI Learning Hub. What have your thoughts been on that so far? Um, I think the learning hub gives us an advantage with our staff because you have people that are the high achievers and they're already out there learning ai, and then you have the people that are a little bit more cautious or timid about it, and they don't know a lot about ai.

[00:08:27] So with the Learning Hub, what we did to start out is. We took the three introductory most introductory courses in modules in, um, in the learning hub. Mm-hmm. And we had everybody on staff take those three. That way everybody's building off the same foundation. I see. Did you have any more resistance staff members that are not as AI enthusiastic as you perhaps going into it?

[00:08:53] Mm-hmm. There were some that had a little trepidation. It's like, what does AI mean? How's it gonna affect my job? Right. [00:09:00] You hear things out in the news and in the workforce about AI taking over jobs and people being laid off. So people, some people do worry about that. Yeah. But as we go through the education, people are learning that AI can augment what they do rather than replace what they do.

[00:09:16] That is a perfect way to end it. George, thank you so much for joining us on the side cursing. Thank you for having me. Hello everyone. We are joined with Dave Deon right now. Dave, what organization are you with? I'm with the American Paint Horse Association. The American Paint Horse Association. Can you give us like the elevator pitch for what you all do?

[00:09:35] I think people hear paint horses and they go, what? Yeah. Yeah. So we're the world second largest breed registry for horses. And, uh, basically we, our mission statement is to be able to provide meaningful experiences with paint horse. So broad range that covers a lot of ground. Okay. Right. But, uh, it, for people not familiar with the horse world at all, you can kind of think of us a little bit like a [00:10:00] DMV.

[00:10:00] Where we provide a title and registration for a paint horse. Okay. Which is a type of type of horse. A breed of horse. Wow. Yeah. Okay. That's very interesting. I don't know much about paint horses, but I know a lot through you. Sure. Um, what are you thinking of digital now? 2025 so far? Man, it, it, it's been fantastic.

[00:10:18] The whole experience has been great. Uh, I came last year when we were in Washington, DC came back again this year. Uh, I just find an incredible amount of value in what you all are able to share with us insights into not only ai, but the non-profit industry as a whole. Right? Uh, it's huge, uh, and it, and it really, really kind of gets me fired up, motivated every year.

[00:10:43] Uh, after I come to digital now about all the, all the possibilities and all the things that we can potentially do to improve services for our membership and increase the value for our members. Well, we appreciate that. So, speaking of increasing the value for your members, are there any AI projects that you all are [00:11:00] working on mm-hmm.

[00:11:00] Right now that you feel like you've seen impact with? Yeah, so, so about a, I guess it would've been the last November we launched with Betty Bot. That has just been a, a game changer for us on a lot of different levels. So, uh, if, if people aren't familiar with that, it's an AI chat bot feature that really points directly to your information.

[00:11:24] Yeah. So instead of the entire internet, it's really geared towards a PHA information and it's really helped us. We have a, a pretty large organization, uh, close to 40,000 members worldwide. So we have a lot of members that need information when it may be 2:00 AM in Fort Worth and no one's in the office, but they're still trying to do something with us, right?

[00:11:47] And so with through Betty Bot, we're able to answer a lot of their questions. A lot of the things that. They need information on without them having to try to navigate through every part of our website. Uh, [00:12:00] our, our website's enormous and there's lots of good information on there, but Betty is able to look at all of that.

[00:12:06] She's able to look at our rule books specifically and answer rule questions. Those type of things, which normally, uh, only our member care staff would be able to answer. And how many people do you have in terms of member care staff? Yeah. So we have about 16 different people. Okay. That, that work through member care.

[00:12:23] And then we have 42 employees altogether, so everybody ends up answering questions at some point. Alright. And they're related areas, but for the main, main number for people to call and ask questions, there's about 16 there. Okay. And one of the things, those, those same 16. Also will be the ones processing the registrations and the memberships and the paperwork.

[00:12:45] Right. So they're doing a lot of work. They're doing a ton of work. Yeah. And the beautiful part about having Betty is that we've actually seen about a 30% reduction in our phone calls. Based on, uh, uh, the timeframe that we've had Betty Active, [00:13:00] which had really helped increase productivity for all those folks.

[00:13:03] Yep. To where they're not, not trying to answer the phone and process work at the same time. 30%. Sorry if you all hear this dinging when we've gotta head back to sessions, but in terms of tangible ROI, Dave, I love hearing that. Oh. Because we have a lot of listeners on the podcast who are like, we wanna start somewhere, but we need to have something tangible for the board.

[00:13:21] It sounds like you all are doing exactly that. Well, and that, that's exactly why we started with Betty. Like we, we were really interested in doing something with ai, but there's so many options, so many choices. We wanted something that we could kind of see what are the tangible results of this and, and can we really see an ROI coming back and I, I'm very comfortable in saying that we can.

[00:13:43] Well, Dame, thank you so much for sharing that with our audience. We appreciate it. Absolutely, absolutely. Good to see you. Good to see you. Hello everyone. We are at day two of Digital now I am joined here with Matt. If you can introduce us and where you are from in terms of organization. Sure. I'm, uh, Matt [00:14:00] Zeller, Southern Ohio Chamber Alliance.

[00:14:03] Uh, we're based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Awesome. And what brings you all to digital now this year? Yeah, so first of all, we met Sidecar last year. We discovered you guys Okay. Um. Erica was our keynote speaker at our annual meeting right in May. And then of course we wanted to come here, so we're kind of at a crossroads.

[00:14:23] Okay. In, in our organization, we, we've developed some products for chambers of commerce, but in order to, I think, maximize the engagement, we're going to need to, to learn more on implementing AI agents in our business model. Okay. As well as teaching chambers how to do that. Just as well as getting some, some, some data out to Chambers of Commerce, which is going to entail using a lot of AI to, to scrape.

[00:14:51] That sounds like a big project you have ahead of you. Ha. Have you had any favorite sessions that have kind of helped you think about that problem you're facing? [00:15:00] You know, I think that I'll, I'll just, I'll just go back to, to, to one thing and it's with Amme. Yep. Yep. Uh, first of all, he's. Very inspirational, you know that.

[00:15:14] I know. We did not, we did not pay him to say this. That's right. You know. That's right. This is off the cuff, but, but you know, there's one slide that he, that he showed, um, where basically he aggregated data from, I think it was like from a hospital association in Yep. And I'm thinking that we want to, we wanna be the organization that does that for chambers accomplished across the United States.

[00:15:39] That one slide was worth the price of admission because I've been asking all of the different vendors like, who can do this for me? Right. We, we've already gotten some leads only. Well, that's incredible to hear. Matt. Thank you so much for joining us. Do you have any advice for our listeners who might be feeling like they're in this, a similar situation as you?

[00:15:57] Big ideas, but not sure how to execute on those? Just, just [00:16:00] keep taking the next step. I mean, it's one step at a time. You're not going to this, this. Subject matter is moving so fast. Mm-hmm. You're just not going to digest it all at once, so just keep plotting away and, and sometimes it'll be that one slide in a presentation's.

[00:16:16] Right. That, that makes it all worth it. That's right. Thank you, Matt. Thank you, ballon. Hello everyone. I am with the esteemed Bruce Moe from Missouri State Teacher's Association. Bruce, how are you doing? I'm doing well. You just won an award this morning. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

[00:16:33] Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I was surprised. Uh, it's innovation award. Um, and as I understood it, it is, uh, for some of the work that we've done at the Missouri State Teachers Association to introduce AI into our business processes and ways that we're trying to benefit our members. Yep. I, I was telling you this earlier, but I was not surprised you were selected.

[00:16:54] I feel like you've. Had some stellar leadership over MSTA and you all are doing really [00:17:00] awesome things with technology. Is there any one particular project that you're proud of or product or anything like that? I, I think probably the most successful implementation we've had so far has been our version of, of Betty Bot.

[00:17:14] Okay. Um, the knowledge agent, uh, that's been very well received for our members, and we've had that going for over a year. Okay. Have you been able to see any tangible ROI on that, like 30% reduction in X, Y, Z or, you know, I don't know that we've measured it that way, but I have wonderful anecdotal information.

[00:17:31] So, for example, I was at a, at a dinner with some, uh, members, our members or teachers, uh, a few months ago, and I had a, I had a member come to me and say, I just want you to know that I am infatuated. I know, right? Wow. Infatuated with our version of Betty that we call Tilly, and she was redoing all of her curriculum using, uh, Tilly to generate curriculum ideas for her class.

[00:17:59] Yeah. [00:18:00] Do you see other state teacher associations doing something similar? Yeah. In fact, one of our sister organizations, the Association of Texas Professional Educators, just launched their version of Betty Wow. Uh, this last spring, and they've seen great. Great results as well. Is there any, this is a hard question, but any one insight or one session from this year's digital now that has really stuck with you thus far?

[00:18:22] Yeah, I think the one this morning with John Hauser. Yeah. Okay. Um, because it really, you know, one of the challenges is how do you bring people along on the journey with ai? And it talked in very practical ways. Yep. About how we can. Work with our team. And this is a challenge of bringing people along for change.

[00:18:40] Yes. And he's right. It's really, that is a hard part. Yeah. And in that session, for those of you who couldn't attend, he says 70% of a successful technology implementation is about people and processes. Whereas most people think 70% is about the technology itself. It's about people. And I feel like you all have done a really good job of bringing the team along with you.

[00:18:59] Well, we're [00:19:00] trying. Part of that's been, uh, using the sidecar AI learning Hub. To, to train our people, and that's been, uh, very fruitful. We're very happy to hear that. One more question for you. Okay. Have you mandated the Sidecar AI Learning Hub or did you make it optional and why? So we did not mandate it, but we incentivized it.

[00:19:17] Okay. And, um, and we had great, great adoption. I'm about 45 employees and I've had 35 employees complete the process all the way through to certification. Wow. And I have more in process, so I'm very pleased with that. I'm very pleased with that as well. Thank you so much, Bruce. You bet. Thank you. Hello everyone.

[00:19:34] We are on the last day of Digital. Now I am joined by Ann Gergen from AGRiP. Ann, how are you doing? Good. We're, uh, excited to finish up and there's one last session going on right now. One last session going on right now, but I grabbed Anne to be on the pod. I was telling you earlier, we definitely need to have a full podcast episode with you because a grip is doing some incredible work.

[00:19:55] Can you give us maybe like a quick, high level of the big decision that a grip [00:20:00] made last year and how it's going this year? Yeah, so last year we decided that we were gonna spend the year experimenting with ai. We, um, with our board, we met with our team, we got everybody behind it, and we spent most of 2025, um, retooling a handful of initiatives to be fully enabled by ai.

[00:20:19] We put a whole bunch of other stuff on pause, as you know. In order to do that, we really committed to the experimentation. Um, and now actually it's gone well enough. Everything we did. Worked. Um, not everything exactly the way we expected it to. Of course, lesson learned experimentation is a key word. Yes.

[00:20:35] Um, and now we are about to begin 2026 with. AI enabling two more legacy projects. So by the end of 26, we will have touched every single one of our major initiatives. Wow. Well congratulations on that. That's great. I've also gotta say, Anne was given the innovation award at the Digital Now award ceremony, so congrats on that as well.

[00:20:56] What did that mean? One of four? We also had Bruce, um, [00:21:00] an a clip on this episode, but what does that mean to you? Who's presenting now? Yep. Um, yeah, it, um. I mean, really it's, it's more about our board of directors mm-hmm. And their commitment and our group as a, our team members as well who said, yeah, let's go play and let's experiment.

[00:21:14] And, um, I mean, yeah, it was, it was a cool award for sure. It was nice to be nominated for sure. And also, uh, as. Send three is out now, or I should say a send third edition. We actually have a basically a whole chapter about you and a grip, which is exciting. It's the managing change chapter. Everybody, if you wanna check that out, you can go to sidecar.ai/ai.

[00:21:37] And can you talk a little bit about, like, give people a teaser. The whole chapter is about getting your board on board with ai. So you talked about pausing everything that wasn't AI focused. Basically, if you could sum it up, like how did you do that with your board and with your staff? Yeah. We had that magical moment, and actually it's captured really well in the book.

[00:21:57] We had this magical moment of sitting with our board [00:22:00] and staff together in a room and envisioning three different futures. Mm-hmm. Um, one where we completely empowered, enabled a grip with ai, uh, to where we watched and waited and kind of seeded. Saw seed, saw what happened with other associations. Yeah.

[00:22:16] And followed their lead, kind of a fast follower. Okay. Um, and then the third where we really did nothing and kept on status quo. And that was a pretty magical exercise because when you go through that mental process and think about what would we look like in five years mm-hmm. If we took one of these three pathways.

[00:22:35] The answer became pretty obvious, so I love that. If you want more detail on it, check out the book, ascend third edition. And for you, Anne, coming into digital now in 2025, this year, I would say being ahead of the pack in many ways. What were you hoping to get out of the event and what are you walking away with?

[00:22:52] And if I feel good coming in, I always feel like there's more opportunity on the way out the door. Yeah. Because coming into this, like I don't really think it matters where [00:23:00] we are in the pack. What matters is what we're doing for our members and what more we could be doing for our members. Yep. And this is the absolute best opportunity to just.

[00:23:08] Think about what more we could be doing. Mm-hmm. So every one of these sessions, I'm sitting with my team and you could, if, if you were watching us from the back of the room, you'd see us all leaning over and kind of whispering to each other, jotting down because everybody's got like, oh, we could do that, and what if we took this piece and we, we just shifted it a little bit so that it would work for our membership this way.

[00:23:26] And so, yeah, we're just in gather idea modes and, and this is where we get all of those good ideas to take back and put to work. Yep. Did you have a favorite session if you had to pick? Oh boy. I've been asking people. I don't, I don't have one. Yes, all of yesterday was really fantastic. Um, you know, we've done work, uh, John Husman.

[00:23:45] Um, we find him to have that really great pragmatic approach for us. And so, uh, he's got big ideas, but he could break it down for us in a way that's really useful. Mm-hmm. Um, so he did a great session yesterday actually. Um. That dolphin [00:24:00] session. Did you enjoy that one? Yeah. Yeah. Super different. Yes. You know, not directly applicable, right?

[00:24:05] But how interesting to just sit back and let your brain spin out on the possibilities of what could be, and also AI for good, which I think is like a big kind of abstract topic, but like what can AI do in the rest of the world? A great for associations, but for like medical breakthroughs for dolphin communication, like there's a lot of opportunity out there.

[00:24:22] Well, and eye opening, right? Like if you are still on that. And that hesitancy around, is this really gonna have the kind of impact? Yeah, of course it is. Yes. And that was a great session for that reminder. Yeah. And thank you so much for your time. Of course. So great to see you. Thank you. Yep. Thanks. Well, folks, I am no longer in Chicago.

[00:24:40] I'm actually sitting at my desk back here in Atlanta, Georgia, reflecting and thinking about how incredible digital now 2025 was to. It's always an amazing event for me. That was my fourth digital now, but each year I leave just a bit more inspired than I did before, which is hard to believe. But digital now, [00:25:00] 2025 was no different.

[00:25:01] We had some incredible sessions, keynote speakers. The venue was great. The food was 10 out of 10, but really at the end of the day. All of those things were great, the keynote speakers, what have you. But the thing that makes digital now so special and impactful to me is all of you. And I don't wanna be cheesy, but I really mean that seeing so many association leaders there, passionate, excited, asking good hard questions about the topics at hand, thinking about new ways to serve their members and the downstream impact that has on the people that their members serve.

[00:25:42] The association community is so. Incredible. And I know that is not news to all of you. That's probably while why you were all a part of this community, but I leave amazed every time. There's nothing like an in-person event. All of you are familiar with this because you have your annual meetings and [00:26:00] such within your associations, but there is something so special, so human about feeling the energy in a room.

[00:26:06] I got to moderate the day two keynote panel. Which I was a little nervous about actually, but I had a blast and ugh. It's just always such a good feeling to come off of an event like digital. Now, I wanna say a sincere thank you to everyone that I interviewed in this episode. Pretty much all of them had no idea that we would be doing that until about two minutes before we started recording, so it was all on the fly.

[00:26:32] Thank you so much to everyone who participated. I hope you all have enjoyed this different episode we've been talking about am and I doing a, a live kind of in the field version of the Sidecar Sync Podcast, so I hope you all enjoyed it and I wanna let you all know that we've got digital now 2026 already planned.

[00:26:52] It's going to be October 25th through the 28th, 2026 in Washington, DC [00:27:00] and that's going to be at the Hilton Arlington, Roslyn. The key hotel, so we are super excited about that. To bring the event back to DC I will be there. Amme will be there. You can sign up right now. We'll link it in the show notes for the pre-registration list so that you can be alerted as soon as the registration is made available.

[00:27:20] Everybody. Thank you for tuning in to this special episode and you know the drill. We will see you all next week. Thanks for tuning into the Sidecar SYC podcast. If you want to dive deeper into anything mentioned in this episode, please check out the links in our show notes. And if you're looking for more in depth AI education for you, your entire team, or your members, head to sidecar.ai.