By now, the algorithm has shown us all a non-stop parade of AI tools that promise to do everything from designing our logos to microwaving our food (I kid you not). But when you actually try to use some of those tools for real work, the results range from meh to mangled. Worse, AI is sometimes positioned to take over the creative process in ways that nobody asked for, and destroying the credibility of the poor, beleaguered em dash to boot.
But CreativePro Week isn’t about “solutions” that don’t solve anything for creatives. We’ll tell you where AI can help, and where it falls short of the hype.
Here are six AI-focused sessions that, taken together, will leave you smarter about what AI can do, clearer about what it shouldn’t, and a lot more confident about bringing both messages back to your team.
Scripting Success: Finding and Creating Your Own Automated Solutions
If the phrase “I’ll just write a script” has always sounded like something other people do, this session is your invitation to join the club. Erica and I will show you how to spot the repetitive, soul-sapping tasks lurking in your day, how to find scripts that already solve them, or how to build your own with the help of AI (i.e. no coding skills necessary). Think of it as the gateway drug to the rest of this track: Once you see how much of your week can be automated, you will never look at a tedious batch job the same way again. Note: This is an in-person-only session, so you gotta come to Nashville to be part of it.
Creative Leadership in the Age of AI
Art directors and creative leads, this one is for you. Leading a team through a technology shift this big is not just a tooling question; it’s a people question, a process question, and a culture question. To help you find the answers, Vince Wanga will share how to mentor designers whose craft is changing underfoot daily, how to protect your team’s creative identity, and how to set policies that keep clients happy and junior talent growing. And you’ll understand why the speed of AI won’t get you where you want to go without a strong direction from the humans in charge.
AI in Design: Helpful, Overrated, or Both?
Michael Flarup’s session gets my vote for best title on the CreativePro Week schedule. Incredibly, he didn’t use an em dash! And knowing him, the content will be killer too. This is a clear-eyed look at where generative AI is actually earning its keep in design work, where it is still mostly smoke and mirrors, and where the truth is, surprise, surprise, some of both. Come for the practical examples of using AI intelligently, stay for the nuanced takes from someone who is deeply passionate about great design.
Acrobat Studio: An AI Solution for Document Overwhelm
Raise your hand if your desktop contains a folder called “PDFs_FINAL_v7_REALLY_FINAL.” Acrobat Studio is Adobe’s answer to the document sprawl that quietly eats our afternoons and nibbles at our souls. This session by the amazing Nicte Cuevas will show you how Acrobat’s AI features can summarize, search, compare, and wrangle your PDFs into something resembling order. Expect practical demos, a few genuine gasps, and at least one moment where you text a coworker “we need this.”
Build Agentic Solutions for the Work You Dread (Part 1 and 2)
Here’s another one (well, two) in-person-only sessions that make it worth making the trip to Tennessee.
Agentic AI (systems that can take multi-step actions on your behalf) is the frontier everyone is whispering about, and in Part 1 of Amy Balliett’s talk you will actually get your hands on it. This is choose-your-adventure stuff. The group will map out one of those tasks you all dread, then start assembling an agent to handle it. No computer science degree required; enthusiasm for reclaiming your afternoons very much is.
Then, in Part 2, you ship. You will refine the agent you started in Part 1, stress-test it against real-world curveballs, and learn how to hand it off to teammates without creating a new support job for yourself. By the end, you will walk out with a working solution to a task you genuinely hate. More importantly, you’ll have a template for building the next one, and the one after that.
Boring Bits Are for Bots
Six sessions, one clear theme: AI is not coming for your creativity. It is coming for the parts of your job that were not all that creative to begin with. CreativePro Week 2026 is where you learn to tell the difference, make the tools work for you, and head home with a plan. Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto.
CreativePro members: Don’t forget to use your discount code found on the Member Benefits page!
This article was last modified on April 20, 2026
This article was first published on April 20, 2026
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