The use of artificial intelligence has exploded exponentially in recent years, and AI related companies including Microsoft (part owner of Open AI, the developer of ChatGPT)  and NVIDIA have driven the stock market to record highs.

AI can achieve some miraculous things. It allows users to unlock their phone with their face, correct spelling mistakes they didn’t even realize they made, receive specific directions to new locations, keep homes and cottages at just the right temperature and detect fraud in financial accounts, among a million other things.

And that’s just the simple stuff.

AI will continue to transform our lives in ways we can’t even imagine.

But, it can’t do everything.

You can use an App to determine the amount of money in your account, the various rates it might accumulate based on the ways you invest it, and the optimum number of years you should spend working to build that account before you begin the withdraw from it.

Those are just numbers, though, and retirement planning involves so much more.

AI can’t solve the very human situations we all encounter as we cycle through life.

For instance, AI would not talk you through your options when a diagnosis scuttles all those careful retirement plans you made as a young, healthy couple.

You’d need a human financial advisor who will listen to your fears and guide you through the sometimes painful adjustment of your goals.

An advisor can help you figure out a way to buy that RV you have your eye on so you and your spouse, who has just been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease, can make the most of the time you have left together.

You need an empathetic human to walk you through ways to protect heirs who have developed addictions that would make a windfall inheritance dangerous to them.

And only a human advisor can help you evaluate your long-term care options from a personal, emotional perspective, to figure out where you will feel most comfortable. That’s different for everyone and the plan should be too.

So, while we’re as excited as everyone else about the tremendous capacity AI offers, we also know that even transactional businesses like financial planning rely on human connection to succeed.

And we’re here for that every day.