Opposing View: What If Prompt Fluency Is the New Foundation?
By Justin Naidoo | Marketing Career Coach | Strategic Marketing Consultant
Let’s flip the lens for a moment.
For weeks, I’ve been talking about the risk of entry-level and junior marketers skipping foundational experience in favour of AI shortcuts. But what if, the skeptics are wrong?
What if AI fluency really is the new foundation of marketing?
The case for prompt fluency as the new baseline
The argument goes something like this:
AI is the new workplace standard. Just as Excel was once a “bonus skill” and is now table stakes, prompt engineering and tool mastery could become the same
Speed is the competitive edge. Marketers who can rapidly produce, test, and iterate using AI tools will outpace those still relying on manual processes
Creativity is redefined. Crafting the right AI prompt could be the new equivalent of writing the perfect headline or campaign brief. An art in and of itself
If you’re a junior marketer today, maybe mastering prompts, workflows, and AI-powered analytics isn’t a shortcut. Maybe it’s the very thing that makes you employable and valuable.
There’s truth in that.
But here’s where balance matters
I respect this perspective. In fact, I coach professionals who’ve built entire roles around AI integration. They’re thriving.
But here’s the caution: prompt fluency without instincts is fragile.
Because at the senior level, your job isn’t just to produce output. It’s to:
Sense patterns in markets and people that no algorithm can predict
Guide teams through ambiguity and conflict
Tell stories that resonate with human emotion, not just data
AI can help with speed, but it can’t substitute the judgment calls, leadership presence, or creative instincts that truly define a marketing leader.
Hybrid fluency: the real edge
The strongest marketers I see today are blending both:
AI fluency to accelerate execution, test ideas quickly, and keep pace with change
Human instincts to build trust, shape narratives, and make strategic leaps when the data is inconclusive
It’s not either/or. It’s both.
Why coaching matters here
This is exactly where coaching plays a role.
For mid and senior career marketers, the challenge isn’t choosing between AI fluency or leadership instincts—it’s developing both, intentionally.
Through coaching, we build:
A stronger technical toolkit to stay relevant in an AI-driven industry
A sharper strategic lens to lead teams, not just tasks
A more confident sense of judgment and presence to thrive as careers advance
The future belongs to marketers who are hybrid fluent and able to prompt a machine and inspire a team in the same breath.
Closing thought
Maybe prompt fluency is the new foundation. But it’s only half the story.
Without balance, we risk raising a generation of marketers who are lightning-fast but shallow in judgment. With balance, though, we can unlock something powerful: leaders who can leverage AI for what it does best, while leaning on human instincts for what only people can do.
And that balance—technical and human—is what I help professionals develop every day.