Russell Fugett: Judgment Call

Russell Fugett
  • 4.3 (6)
  • Business
  • Updated Weekly

Judgment Call is a show about judgment at the intersection of AI, business, and life. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's a fifth-generation entrepreneur, AI strategist, and solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Full story at fugettlabs.com and russellfugett.com.

  1. 1h ago

    Reward Outcomes, Not Prompt Theater

    Wall Street firms are starting to tie raises, bonuses and promotions to AI skills. Russell says paying for tool use misses the point unless the scorecard measures better judgment, cleaner work, or real business results. Reward outcomes, not prompt theater. He explains why money motivates for a few months at most, why culture and change management decide whether AI pays off, and why the real risk is going fast in the wrong direction. Then the rest of Thursday's news: AI in job interviews, people who call their chatbot a friend, a parent who came back from leave to a new AI system nobody trained her on, why onboarding and offboarding belong in every AI rollout, women and access to AI tools, YouTube Music labeling AI songs, AI and worker bargaining power, Anthropic's reported cash flow, FTC subpoenas to AI companies, and Bill Gates turning his attention to AI risk. About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  2. 1d ago

    AI Is a Mirror, Not an Intelligence (Dr. Karla Bailey)

    Dr. Karla Bailey is the founder and executive director of IITEL, the International Institute of Technology, Education, and Leadership. She helps education, government, and workforce organizations evaluate, adopt, and govern new technology responsibly, and she is writing a policy book on how the world governs emerging technology in education. On Judgment Call, she makes the case that AI is not new in education, that it works as a mirror and an exposer as much as an accelerator, and that learning is a human act no tool can do for you. We talk about who should decide when a school adopts AI, the privacy risk people miss, why accountability always lands on a person and never on the software, and why she would not write an AI policy first. She starts with your data governance instead. We finish with the skills workers will still need as AI changes the workforce. Guest: Dr. Karla Bailey, Founder & Executive Director, International Institute of Technology, Education, and Leadership (IITEL) IITEL: https://www.iitelsolutions.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karla-bailey About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  3. 2d ago

    Can AI Do This Better With Me, Not For Me?

    Marnie Wills started using AI in 2021, before most people had heard of ChatGPT. She was a former England athlete and PE teacher, she had built a fitness business and a children's PE franchise, and she will tell you herself that she is not a techie. Today she trains leaders and experts to build AI into their businesses, with one question at the center: can AI do this better with me, not for me? On Judgment Call, Marnie walks through her three-step framework: Customise, Build, Agentic. We get into why your business, not a freelancer's personal account, should own the data you and AI create together, why you probably don't need ten off-the-shelf AI agents, and her 20-60-20 rule for keeping the human in the loop. Then we put on the futuristic hat: the three mindsets she says people will need by 2030, how she tells businesses to govern AI when the rules are still unsettled, and why she thinks the next generation will create the next jobs. Guest: Marnie Wills, AI trainer and strategist, founder of AILA (AI Leadership Applied) AILA: https://ai-leadership-applied.lovable.app/ Expert to AI: https://expert-to-ai-asset-pro.lovable.app/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marnie-wills-entrepreneur #PodMatch About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  4. 3d ago

    AI Adds to Your Mental Load. Plan for It

    Six in ten small business AI users say they now produce more without adding staff. Russell says that makes AI an owner's decision: what do you do with the capacity you just saved? He works through Monday's news with that question. Why AI can raise the mental load even as it saves time, when people are built to focus. Book publishers reportedly using AI without telling authors. A judge tossing a complaint reported to be AI-drafted, and the standard that matters: can a human defend every claim? A dental hygienist shortage that shows not every job is on AI's list. A law firm letting associates count AI training toward their billable hours. And why governance, not another tool, is the real gap. Plus the story of Russell's stepmother, who hand-drew on-air news graphics at ABC News until computers took the work, and a preview of this week's interviews with Marnie Wills on Tuesday and Dr. Karla Bailey on Wednesday. About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  5. 6d ago

    AI Companies Are Planning for the Day After

    Almost half of surveyed US employees admit they exaggerated their AI use at work. Russell says that is not a technology problem, it is a leadership problem, and works through Friday's news with that lens. McKinsey finds AI makes workers more productive but not companies more profitable. Google's reported bid for Spirit Airlines data raises the question of who owns a dead company's emails. Flock Safety faces public backlash. Anthropic bars abusive behavior toward Claude. Then the heavy one: an Axios report that AI executives are privately planning for the day after a catastrophic AI event. Plus a first on-air appearance from Russell's AI assistant, a look at the guardian agent he built this week, and a preview of next week's interviews with Marnie Wills and Dr. Karla Bailey. About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  6. Oct 8

    Slow Down to Speed Up

    Your AI agents are not free employees. Russell opens with the Tuesday episode he recorded with the mic off, then makes the case he keeps coming back to: governance is an enabler, not a brake, and you have to slow down to speed up. Today's news backs it up. Boston Consulting Group finds companies are adopting AI agents at more than double last year's pace, and the people watching them describe "AI brain fry." The Guardian reports that misuse of AI is now the top reputational threat for public affairs leaders, and that Pause AI's volunteer signups are surging. Heartland Forward finds most small business owners who skip AI say they see no need, not that it costs too much. HSBC plans deep cuts in its UK wealth business, and a survey of nearly 31,000 developers finds burnout and little trust in AI for important decisions. Plus Russell on finishing his Harvard intensive in AI strategy, governance, and agentic systems. About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

  7. Oct 7

    The JUDGE Checklist: Five Questions Before AI Makes the Call

    Nobody decides to hand their judgment to AI. It sneaks up on you, one reasonable shortcut at a time. Daniel C. Rodgers spent twenty years building AI and running programs at Microsoft and Google, and he watched it happen inside the companies building the tools. On Judgment Call's first guest episode, Daniel walks through the five checks he runs before he lets AI take on any decision: Justify, Undo, Designate, Guard, and Exercise. Then we get into the three phases of AI still ahead, why a kill switch is a last resort rather than a plan, and the question at the center of his novel Killswitch: once AI runs everything well, who gets to decide whether to turn it off? We close with how he retired at 43 and what "enough" means. Guest: Daniel C. Rodgers, WMCP, author of Killswitch and former AI program technical lead at Google Killswitch: https://www.escapetheclock.com/books/killswitch/ Escape The Clock podcast: https://www.escapetheclock.com/podcast Website: https://www.escapetheclock.com About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL PodMatch: https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett

  8. Oct 5

    Obscurity Is Not Privacy

    A Princeton researcher used AI and public records to rebuild the order of nearly every in-person ballot cast in Georgia's May primary. Nothing was hacked. The data was already public, just hard to connect, and AI made it easy. Russell's takeaway for anyone holding data: obscurity is not privacy. Also today: an AI Greta Garbo and who owns your name, image, and likeness; the Smithsonian using AI to connect artifacts from the American Revolution, and why the machine finds the pattern but people decide what it means; women and the AI hiring gap; a federal judge who wants junior lawyers drafting without AI; Google beating the publisher lawsuits over AI Overviews; a new American open-weight model; Sam Altman and Anthropic on religion and AI; Pope Leo on human creativity; and a new AI czar. About the show Judgment Call is live every weekday morning. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's an entrepreneur, AI strategist, solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Missing phone calls means missing revenue. Get Joe, the AI voice agent who's always on call. Visit https://fugettlabs.com to learn more. Have a bigger AI question for your business? Book a free AI Opportunity Discovery Call: https://audit.fugettlabs.com Want to be a guest, or have a thought to add? https://fugettlabs.com/about Fugett Labs: https://fugettlabs.com Russell Fugett: https://russellfugett.com Follow @russellfugett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrussellfugett/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@russellfugett Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russellfugett Tools I use (affiliate links; I may earn a commission if you sign up) Claude: https://claude.ai/referral/cC2wZqegHw Wispr Flow: https://wisprflow.ai/r?J22272 Lovable: https://lovable.dev/invite/KLWQBUL BetterHelp (online therapy): https://www.betterhelp.com/rpc/f28c16d729eb10d8-5-01?utm_term=ref_v2_dd PodMatch (find podcast guests and shows): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/russellfugett GoFractional (find executive-level fractional work or fractional talent): https://www.gofractional.com/r/j-russell-fugett

See All (64)

Trailer

Ratings & Reviews

4.3
out of 5
6 Ratings

About

Judgment Call is a show about judgment at the intersection of AI, business, and life. Every weekday, Russell Fugett thinks out loud about the decisions AI can't make for you. He's a fifth-generation entrepreneur, AI strategist, and solutions architect, and a man of faith who builds real things with AI and talks plainly about the judgment behind them. No script. Five minutes or an hour, sometimes live from wherever he is. As the show grows, guests will start dropping in. Full story at fugettlabs.com and russellfugett.com.

Information

  • Creator
    Russell Fugett
  • Years Active
    2018 - 2026
  • Episodes
    64
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Russell Fugett