Navigating AI in Professional Services: Balancing Efficiency and Credibility

Understanding the Challenges of AI Adoption

This case comes from a photographer I recently worked with. She sought help with her blog writing.

She already had a website, a clear point of view, and strong client feedback. The issue was not a lack of ideas. Instead, it was about energy and consistency. Writing blog posts took time, and starting from a blank page felt heavier each month.

AI seemed like an obvious solution. However, early in our conversation, she stopped me.

“I don’t want to press a button and publish.” What she meant became clear quickly.

She wasn’t worried about speed or quality in the abstract. Her concern was about credibility. She feared that a client might read something and think, this doesn’t sound like her. She described it as embarrassing. Not a disaster, but enough to undermine trust.

The Real Risk Wasn’t the Technology

On the surface, her concern appeared to be a common AI worry: “I don’t want generic output.”

However, underneath that was something more specific. Her work relies on trust. Clients invite her into family moments. They choose her because her tone feels personal and grounded. Publishing something that sounded automated would undermine that.

This wasn’t about perfectionism. It was about standing behind her work.

In professional services, that distinction matters. Leaders are often described as “resistant” to AI when, in reality, they are protecting their credibility. The risk they are managing is not efficiency loss; it is reputational damage.

Once that risk is named explicitly, the conversation becomes more practical.

Shifting the Conversation

We didn’t start by generating content. Instead, we slowed the process down.

Rather than “use AI to write blogs,” the approach became:

• Capture ideas in her own words.

• Turn those notes into a short outline.

• Draft against that outline, using her existing writing as a reference.

• Review and edit before anything is shared.

• Keep human sign-off explicit.

  
  

Each step was visible and reversible. Nothing was published without her reading it and deciding it felt like hers. AI was doing the heavy lifting in the middle, not taking ownership of the output.

At that point, she said it felt doable. Not exciting or transformative, but manageable.

Why This Matters Beyond One Photographer

I’ve observed this pattern repeatedly, particularly with small and solo professional service firms. Earlier this year, during my research interviews, the same concern surfaced in different forms:

• Consultants worried about sounding generic to clients.

• Lawyers uneasy about relying on text they couldn’t fully explain.

• Professionals concerned about standing in front of work they didn’t fully recognise as their own.

  
  

In each case, the hesitation was framed as caution about quality. In reality, it was about credibility.

AI adoption fails when people feel it threatens how they are perceived by clients, peers, or regulators. That threat does not need to be dramatic to be decisive. Mild embarrassment is often enough.

This is why blanket AI rollouts struggle. People assume the problem is capability, but often, it is confidence.

The Practical Implication for Leaders

If you are deciding how far to invest in AI for your firm, this is the question that matters:

Where does AI genuinely help, and where does it put credibility at risk?

That is not a technical question. It is a judgement call.

In this case, AI helped with drafting and structuring. It did not replace authorship or sign-off. That boundary made adoption possible.

In larger firms, the same principle applies. AI can support preparation, synthesis, and consistency. But the moment it removes someone’s ability to stand behind the work, adoption stalls. This is not because people are irrational; they are simply being careful.

A More Useful Way to Think About Adoption

Progress did not come from asking her to trust the technology more. It came from designing ways of working where trust was not required upfront.

Clear steps, checks, and ownership are essential. Once those are in place, adoption tends to follow.

If you are wrestling with decisions about AI in your firm, especially in client-facing or judgement-heavy work, this is often the missing conversation.

If you want to discuss where AI helps in your context and where it threatens credibility, get in touch. We can explore whether it’s a useful conversation to have and what would help next.

Name withheld for anonymity.