IT Pros Have Seen This Before: Thriving Through the AI Evolution

Because you’ve survived every other shift,  this one’s no different.

Token Ring. xcopy. PowerShell. Cloud. Every generation said it would make you obsolete. Every time, the IT pros who leaned in came out ahead. AI is next and the playbook hasn’t changed.

If you’ve managed a Windows 2000 rollout at 2 AM, written your first script to stop doing something manually for the 40th time, or migrated an entire on-prem estate to Azure while keeping the business running you already know how this goes.

In this keynote, Sonia cuts through the AI noise with something more useful than hype: perspective. Using real-world examples and the kind of storytelling that actually sticks, she maps where AI fits into the long arc of tech evolution and what it means specifically for the people keeping infrastructure alive.

This isn’t about being replaced. It’s about using AI to kill the tickets that shouldn’t exist, offload the repetitive grind, and finally have the headspace for the work that actually matters.

What you’ll walk away with

• A clear-eyed view of where AI fits in the history of IT — and why your experience is an asset, not a liability.
• Practical examples of AI removing friction from real IT workflows — not theoretical demos, but things you can act on Monday morning.
• How to identify the high-friction, low-value work in your environment that AI should be handling instead of you.
• A renewed sense of momentum — because the IT pros who shape the tooling are always the ones who thrive in the next wave.