Denise Reed - Professional Speaker
Denise Reed

Making plans that take flight offering practical tips for success

Photo by: Kyle Miller, Wooden Steampunk Wings by Thin Gypsy Thief Studios

Vivacious…

Welcome to Denise Reed craziness of practical problem solving…this is the continuing saga of living in a world of entrepreneurs, creatives, and just being a part of some awesome business adventures taking flight. I’ll be sharing the highlights of what I experience in hopes that it will inspire you!

My first highly successful business adventure which continues to grow is The Concierge Office Suites. It’s a full-service office space in downtown Chattanooga, TN. We help cultivate businesses through providing a business environment that goes beyond “renting an office.” The whole concept is built around the idea of concierge services making it happen for our clients. The business was established in 1995, I was able purchase it in 2006. This business is beyond incubation. We’re full-on soaring.

We’re in the flap around stage of this business, and we've taken off. Let the craziness begin. My husband and I began a 40-acre commercial broiler poultry farm in 2014, Wing and a Prayer. We are celebrating it's successful sale in January of 2023.

I’m sure you’re sensing a theme here of flight. No, I’m not a pilot, at least for a literal plane. I do feel like a pilot for the businesses I’ve been involved in over the course of my life. I check the business flight path, equipment to get the job done, flight personnel to make it happen and away we go! This whole flying thing began when my parents told me I could do anything I set my mind to do. I remember watching my Dad fly off on business trips from the airport. I was fascinated by the whole experience ever since. I love to travel, meet new people, and encourage other people to soar beyond where they are in life. I've been speaking in public consistently since 2006 sharing what I've learned in hopes that I could help another business person avoid some pitfalls in their business. Pull up a comfy chair and check out my adventures here.

Many thanks go to Kyle Miller with Thin Gypsy Thief Studios for the awesome web page header photograph!

The Latest From the Blog

Denise Reed, podcaster

How I Started My Live Streaming Podcast Journey

Join me, Denise Reed the president of The Concierge Office Suites, in my very first live stream using StreamYard broadcasting over diverse social media platforms—Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube—I am excited about stepping into 2024 with renewed vigor. I want you to be a part of this new chapter. The Concierge Office Suites, a venture that has thrived since 1995, offers insights into private office rental, virtual office positioning, event rental spaces, and business concierge support. This video livestream and podcast opens the door for more individual connections as I promise more exciting announcements for 2024.

In a bid to help others become more effective marketers, I’m determined to stress the importance of sharing your unique story. Through my own personal journey, I discovered that one’s story is a compelling reason for others to care. As I reflect on transformative “a-ha” moments that help me identify the significance of storytelling, I was led to work with a storytelling coach, Melissa Reeves, CEO and founder of Story Fruition.

My commitment to storytelling brought me to a competitive level, where I not only participated in a speech competition but traveled to Atlanta, Georgia to compete. This video below emphasizes the power of starting where you are and sharing your authentic story since it offers a glimpse into my passions and motivations. Check out my personal anecdotes, from working in my grandmother’s gift shop in the Pocono Mountains to supporting my single mother’s professional monogramming enterprise encapsulating the entrepreneurial spirit that led me to establish The Concierge Office Suites.



The live stream below wraps up with an emphasis on the transcendent importance of personal stories to form the bedrock of personal and corporate branding. I urge you, my live-stream audience, to anticipate more engaging and riveting content in the future. Watch, get inspired, and prepare to release the power of your story into the world as I’m sharing mine.

#justapointofview #itsthelittlethings #livestreaming #podcasting #storytelling #pursuitofhappiness

JAPOV E#3 S#6 Header Image - Denise Reed in her steampunk office creating AI magic

Know the Rules to Bend Them: The Creative Case for Thinking Outside the Lines

A polished steampunk-inspired rulebook opening into hot-pink creative light in a private executive boardroom

There’s a hush in the hall of the Chattanooga Convention Center.

I’m just outside the Project Voice 2026 event: a decade of conversational AI. The co-founder of Siri, Adam Cheyer, is keynoting. I arrived with a press pass, a microphone, and a video camera. I expected to hear about the conversational AI market and what it would mean for white-collar businesses, attorneys, financial advisors, executives, and other professionals.

Instead, between sessions, I found myself in a small circle of creatives discussing something far more important. This is Part 1 of a round-robin conversation with Anthony Webb, Clyde Harris, and Penny Styles that covered far more ground than one episode could hold. The whole conversation is about amplification, not replacement. It’s about what happens when the creative process changes but the person behind it stays exactly, unmistakably themselves, with more ways to develop and promote their creativity.

Find out what happens when AI changes the creative process, but the human being behind the work remains unmistakably themselves?

AI Does Not Replace the Artist. It Opens the Door.

Clyde Harris and Penny Styles run Nu Fangled TV, a production company Penny founded in 2005. Their experience predates the current AI conversation by decades.

When they introduced AI into their creative process, they did not hand over the keys. They maintained control over every professional layer: writing, casting, production, and mastering.

Then they signed a screenwriter.

He was a poet.

He had spent his life writing from the heart. He never thought of himself as a lyricist. Clyde and Penny saw something in his work that he could not yet see in himself.

They did not put his words in a box.

They put them in an amplifier.

His poetry came back as fully produced songs, ready for release on streaming platforms. He was, in Penny’s words, gobsmacked. He had never imagined that his poems could become songs.

That is not AI replacing an artist.

That is AI handing an artist a door he did not know existed.

I think about this constantly with my clients at The Concierge Office Suites.

Attorneys often tell me they are not storytellers. Financial advisors may assume their expertise is too technical to be compelling on video. Executives may believe their experience is ordinary because they have lived with it for so long.

They are wrong.

There is a story, insight, or hard-earned lesson in each of them. They simply need the right environment and the right process to bring it forward.

That is where the Human Authority Method™ begins.

Your Different Way of Thinking May Be Your Advantage

Anthony Webb is a comedian, AI consultant, and cybersecurity professional. During our conversation, he shared something a chief technology officer once told him:

The person best prepared for the future may not be the most technical person in the room. It may be the person who thinks differently.

That observation stayed with me.

Just before Project Voice 2026, I was also feeding my own backstory, brand, and twelve-month plan into Claude. Not because I wanted a machine to become Denise Reed. I wanted a thinking partner capable of helping me examine more possibilities, more quickly.

That distinction matters.

If you have spent your career being described as too detailed, too intense, too imaginative, or too much, your instincts may be valuable precisely because they do not fit neatly into a spreadsheet.

Penny offered a provocative perspective during our conversation: creativity often requires a brain that notices connections other people overlook.

That is not a weakness.

It is a form of market intelligence.

The strategic pilot does not simply follow the established flight path. The strategic pilot studies the landscape, notices the gap, and determines whether there is a better route.

That is the difference between using AI for novelty and using AI for business.

Know the Rules Before You Bend Them

Clyde Harris is a five-time world champion competitive dancer. I asked him how he reached that level.

His answer was direct: “I knew the rules better than everybody else.”

Clyde and his partner developed a move in which her foot rested on his. It was unconventional. It looked like a lift. Under the competition rules, it did not technically qualify as a lift.

Everyone else saw a rulebook.

Clyde saw the space inside it.

That is disciplined creativity. Not chaos. Not rebellion for its own sake. Mastery first. Innovation second.

Penny captured the idea beautifully: “Once you know the rules, you know how to bend them and still follow them. That’s the joy of creativity.”

This principle applies to every business professional using AI.

Before you ask an AI platform to generate content, you need to know:

  • What your business stands for.
  • Whom you serve.
  • What you believe.
  • Which standards cannot be compromised.
  • What your audience needs to hear from you.
  • How your lived experience shapes your judgment.

AI can help you explore angles. It can organize your ideas. It can accelerate research and content development.

But it cannot supply your authority.

You bring that.

The Human Authority Method™ in Practice

Here is a practical framework for using AI without losing your voice.

1. Start with lived experience

Here’s where your human authority begins. Your background is not unrelated to your business. It is often the source of your strongest positioning.

My own storytelling soul was shaped by experiences ranging from working in my grandmother’s gift shop to helping with a poultry farm. Those experiences taught me about customer service, logistics, responsibility, resourcefulness, and finding opportunity in unexpected places.

Your story may begin in a courtroom, a family business, a hospital, a boardroom, or a completely different industry.

Start there.

2. Establish your rules

Remember accuracy over volume. Create a simple written standard for your content and communication.

Include your tone, values, privacy commitments, professional boundaries, audience, and claims you are unwilling to make. This becomes a living SOP: not a document that disappears into a folder and never guides anyone again.

Review it monthly.

Use it every time you create, whether it’s a graphic, post, presentation, podcast episode, or video.

3. Use AI as a supporting partner

Here’s where method over mayhem comes in. Ask AI to help you:

  • Identify themes in your experience.
  • Generate questions your audience may be asking.
  • Organize a presentation.
  • Create multiple content angles.
  • Tighten a draft while preserving your voice.
  • Turn one thoughtful conversation into several useful assets.

Do not ask it to replace your judgment.

Technology should improve efficiency. It should not become the centerpiece of your identity.

4. Test the idea with real people

All three aspects of the Human Authority Method come together here. Authority is built through connection.

Share the concept with a trusted client, colleague, or professional circle. Notice where people lean in. Notice what they question. Notice what they remember.

Then refine the message.

That is how a standard operating procedure stays alive. It supports action, gathers feedback, and improves with use. Your AI interactions will too.

Why Chattanooga Was the Right Place for This Conversation

Project Voice 2026 took place in Chattanooga, a city with a long history of making room for unusual ideas.

The city became known as the Gig City after EPB built one of the first citywide gigabit fiber networks in the United States. Project Voice 2026 even included a panel on EPB Quantum Network®, one of the first commercial quantum networks in the country, already running right here in Chattanooga. America’s first industry-led, commercially available quantum network specifically designed for running quantum equipment and applications in an established fiber optic environment. Project Voice 2026 brought together people from tech, comedy, cybersecurity, film, production, and business services, including what The Concierge Office Suites offers as a full-service executive suite.

Different industries.

Different experiences.

One conversation.

That is how creative advantage develops. Not in isolation, but through thoughtful intersections between people who see the world differently. If you’re building your own podcast/videocast show and want to talk shop, The Concierge Office Suites is host to SMAC (Social Media Action Club) on the first Tuesday evening of every month. We broadcast live on YouTube from 5:45–7:00 p.m.

You can learn more about Project Voice 2026 and its focus on conversational AI innovation.

Where Human Authority Gets Made

This episode of Just a Point of View was produced in the Vlogging Studio at The Concierge Office Suites, located in the Republic Centre, the tallest building in Chattanooga.

The studio includes five professional backdrops, professional lighting, a teleprompter, and a mixing board. It is designed for video recording, podcasting, presentations, and professional storytelling.

You bring the message.

The studio helps you present it with authority.

For attorneys, financial advisors, healthcare professionals, consultants, and executives, professional presence is not decoration. It is part of the client experience. Privacy, polish, and preparation matter.

The same philosophy extends to our business concierge services. We handle the details that distract you from revenue-generating work, so you can focus on your expertise.

That is the value of a true full-service office space. It provides more than a desk. It provides infrastructure, hospitality, discretion, and support.

Whether you need a private office, a meeting room, video recording, or a virtual office in Chattanooga, your professional environment should reinforce the authority you have already earned.

The Professional Presence Society Connection

For month-to-month clients, the Professional Presence Society extends this work into an invitation-only professional community.

Its core pillars are simple:

  • Executive Experience: Learn from seasoned professionals who understand the demands of serious business.
  • Reciprocal Value: Members contribute through consistent sharing, creating a culture of mutual insight rather than passive consumption.

The goal is not to chase every new platform.

The goal is to help capable professionals become more visible, more efficient, and more strategically connected without diluting their standards.

Your Takeaway

The next time you think, “I am not technical enough,” pause.

The next time you think, “I am too creative for this,” pause again.

Your creative instincts may be the very advantage technology can amplify.

But remember the order:

Human authority first. Technology second.

Know your rules. Build your process. Share the truth of your experience. Then use AI to help you explore what becomes possible.

The machine is not the signal.

You are the signal. AI is the amplifier.

Part 2 of this round-robin conversation will explore what happens to the workforce and how the next five years may reshape business.

I promise it will change how you think about your organization, your role, and your next strategic move.

That is just a point of view.

: Denise Reed

Continue the Conversation

Listen and watch more from Denise Reed on YouTube, including Just a Point of View.

Interested in creating a more authoritative professional presence?

Project Voice 2026 promotional graphic for a decade of conversational AI in Chattanooga

What AI Is Really Learning About Your Conversations

Your Experience Just Became Your Greatest Competitive Weapon

By Denise Reed | DeniseReed.is | Just a Point of View — Season 3, Episode 5

Before the doors opened at Project Voice 2026, a decade of conversational AI gathered under one roof in Chattanooga, Tennessee, there was already a crowd in the hallway.

It wasn’t inside, not at the registration table, or at the coffee station.

It was in the hallway!

A small group of people, phones down, leaning in, completely locked into a conversation with one man. It was the kind of attention you cannot manufacture. It was the kind of energy that only happens when someone is saying something that matters.

That man was Mike Pappas, CEO and Co-Founder of Modulate AI. What he has been building since 2017 started in the most unexpected place imaginable. It wasn’t in a corporate boardroom, not in healthcare or financial services. It was in online gaming.

By the end of this post, you will understand three things that are going to change how you think about your business, your voice, and your authority in the AI era. You will know exactly what to do about it — today.


📺 WATCH THE FULL EPISODE

Video episode recorded at The Concierge Office Suites Vlogging Studio, Republic Centre, Chattanooga, Tennessee | Project Voice 2026 Series — Season 3, Episode 5

Prefer to read? Keep scrolling for the full breakdown. ↓


From Call of Duty to the C-Suite: The Backstory Nobody Expected

Modulate AI started in online gaming. Specifically, it began in Call of Duty and Grand Theft Auto. They are some of the biggest, loudest, most chaotic digital environments on the planet.

Hundreds of millions of gamer conversations happen there. Real human beings, every age, every culture, every emotional state imaginable, are talking to each other in real time. Modulate’s job was to teach AI to hear the difference between friendly trash talk and actual hostility. This kind of toxicity drives people off platforms and costs companies millions in lost users.

Here is why this matters to every attorney, financial advisor, executive, and business professional reading this.

What you learn from hundreds of millions of real human voice interactions: across cultures, across ages, across every kind of emotional state. This is worth more than any laboratory study ever conducted. It is real. It is raw. It is exactly the training ground you need to build AI that truly understands how human beings actually communicate.

Modulate has been building this instinct digitally at a massive scale since 2017. Now they are bringing it into the spaces where it matters most: customer support, fraud prevention, call centers, and anywhere a voice conversation determines whether a client stays or walks.


What Is AI Actually Hearing in Your Conversations?

Modulate’s AI system, Velma, uses over 100 different models to analyze voice. She’s not just listening to what you say, but how you say it: the pace, the pitch, the timbre of your voice, the pregnant pause before you answer a question you are not comfortable with. It’s the cultural nuance hiding inside a perfectly reasonable sentence.

If you are an attorney, and I work with attorneys every single day at The Concierge Office Suites, you already know that tone may be evidence. The way a witness answers a question tells you as much as the answer itself. AI can analyze recorded depositions for emotional incongruence, which is not science fiction. This is where this technology is going right now, today.

If you are in financial services or sales, think about what it means to have AI that can recognize when a client is anxious about a recommendation but too polite to say so. It’s the gap between what a client says and what they mean. It’s where trust is built or broken forever.

If you are building a personal brand, a podcast, a social videocast, a YouTube channel, understanding the emotional impact of your own voice is not just interesting. This is your competitive edge.


What Is The Human Authority Method™?

Here is where I need to connect some dots. What Mike Pappas, Co-founder of Modulate, just described is not happening in a vacuum.

I have been building a business for 30 years. I have served attorneys, financial advisors, bankers, software developers, healthcare professionals, consultants, coaches and more. My average client stays with me for over seven years. Several have been with The Concierge Office Suites for 28 of our 30 years in business.

We didn’t just fall off the turnip truck here. This is not a technology story. This is a human authority story.

It taught me something no AI conference, no software platform, and no productivity tool has ever been able to replicate.

The professionals who win consistently over decades are the ones who leverage their experience, their instincts, and their humanity as their primary competitive weapon. Then, and only then, do they use technology to amplify what they already do brilliantly.

I call that The Human Authority Method™.

It has three principles. They are simpler than anything you will hear at a technology conference:

1. Human Authority First. Your years of experience, your expertise, your relationships, your judgment, your instincts. These are NOT liabilities in the AI era. They are your most valuable assets. AI cannot replicate what you know from lived experience. Strategic professionals lead with lived experience.

2. Accuracy Over Volume. You do not need every AI tool or millions of followers. You need the right followers, the right tools that actually solve real problems for people who want what you offer right now. It is the application of speed and accuracy to meet a need in a specific market. This is winning.

3. Method Over Mayhem. Create a repeatable process that beats a brilliant one-time solution every time. The professionals who build sustainable authority in the AI era are the ones with systems — not the ones constantly chasing the next AI platform launch.


Gary (Vee) Vaynerchuk Said It. Joe Pulizzi Proved It. Now AI Is Enforcing It.

Two people are known for figuring this out before AI was even a dinner table conversation.

In 2014, Gary Vaynerchuk stood up and said every company is a media company. Every person should be a media company. The tools are free and everywhere. Producing content is no longer optional. It is the baseline. He said it in 2014. He is still saying it in 2026. As recently as February of this year he declared that media and creative must be under one roof. The businesses, the brands, the professionals that listened a decade ago are the ones with audiences, authority, and revenue streams their competitors cannot touch.

Gary (Vee) Vaynerchuk said it in 2014

Then there is Joe Pulizzi, the man known as the Godfather of Content Marketing, the man who built the Content Marketing Institute from scratch. This man, Gary Vee himself called one of the most important people in the history of the internet. Joe’s thesis was simple and devastating for anyone who ignored it: don’t start with your product and find customers for it. Start with your audience. You will always be able to build a successful business around serving your audience.

Joe Pulizzi creator of the Content Marketing Institute in 2007

Both of them were describing The Human Authority Method™ before it had a name.

In 2026, AI is now flooding every platform, listening to every conversation and evaluating every voice interaction. On behalf of your clients and prospects, what Gary Vee and Joe Pulizzi were both telling you for over a decade is no longer just a smart strategy.

It is your brand survival mechanism.

The question is no longer IF you should show up on video or audio as a serious business professional. The question is, how well do you come across when you do show up?


How Does Voice AI Affect Business Professionals Specifically?

This is where The Human Authority Method™ connects directly to what Modulate AI is building and why it matters to your clients and your business.

AI systems like Velma at Modulate are already being deployed in customer support environments to recognize when a client is frustrated, when a caller may be attempting fraud, and when a support agent needs a break after a difficult interaction. The AI platform is not replacing the human. It is giving the human more intelligence to act on.

For attorneys, this means AI-assisted analysis of recorded depositions for emotional incongruence is coming and coming faster than most law schools are preparing for.

For financial advisors or bankers, it means the gap between what a client says and what they actually feel about a recommendation. It is about to become measurable and addressable in real time.

For every professional building a personal brand, it means your voice: its tone, its confidence, its authenticity. It is now being evaluated on behalf of every person who encounters your content. The question is whether you are showing up with intention or by accident.


The Chattanooga Connection: This City Is Already Moving

Chattanooga does not always wait for permission.

In 2010, when most cities were still arguing about broadband, the Electric Power Board (EPB) built one of the first citywide gigabit fiber networks in the United States. Right now, EPB is pioneering quantum computing. It is the only facility in America making quantum computing and quantum networking commercially available under one roof. It’s not a future project. It’s happening right now in this city.

Hamilton County just approved plans to convert the old downtown jail into a billion-dollar film, music, and AI production complex: a nine-figure investment in the content and entertainment economy of Chattanooga.

The people with the biggest wallets in the room finally figured out what I have known for 30 years from the Republic Centre: Chattanooga is where serious professionals come to do serious work.

Here is the thing about billion-dollar projects. They take time. Approvals. Tennant lease negotiations. Construction timelines. Promises that could stretch 30 years into the future.

Winning is speed and accuracy to meet a repeatable need in the market. That need exists right now, this week, today.


Walk In. Sit Down. Hit Record. The Human Authority Method™ in Action

You now understand that AI is learning to hear the emotional truth inside every voice conversation. You have heard from Gary Vee and Joe Pulizzi for a decade that your business needs to become a media company. You just heard from one of the most fascinating minds in conversational AI, Mike Pappas with Modulate, about exactly where this technology is evolving.

You are thinking: I hear you, Denise. But I do not have the equipment. I do not have the space. I do not have the time to figure all of this out on top of everything else I am already managing.

I hear you. I solved this problem.

Woman ready to record in The Concierge Office Suites Vlogging Studio. You walk in. You sit down. You hit record.

At The Concierge Office Suites, located in the Republic Centre, the tallest high-rise in downtown Chattanooga; we built a plug-and-play professional content creation environment.

You book the Vlogging Studio by the hour. You only pay for the hour you use. No equipment to purchase. No room to dedicate at home. No long-term lease to sign. No setup. No teardown.

You walk in. You sit down. You hit record with your message loaded in our teleprompter.

We have five professional backdrops, including a green screen. Professional lighting. A broadcast-quality video camera. A teleprompter. A professional microphone and mixing board. An award-winning videographer available for filming, editing, and sound correction. A Business Concierge who will sit down with you and help you ideate on your content using AI as the strategy engine, so you show up knowing exactly what to say and how to say it.

You bring your expertise. We handle everything else.

I have watched brilliant professionals, attorneys, financial advisors, software developers, healthcare professionals, consultants, and coaches undersell themselves by remaining silent or videoing from their kitchen or bedroom. The infrastructure to support the growth of your brand exists right now in the heart of downtown Chattanooga.

This is the Human Authority Method™ in action. This is the power of being associated with The Concierge Office Suites.


Your Water Cooler Takeaway

Gary Vee was right. Joe Pulizzi was right. Mike Pappas is on point for what is happening with AI.

30 years of building a business that people stay with for decades taught me something none of them have said from a stage.

Your experience is not a liability in the AI era.

It is your greatest competitive weapon.

Your voice. Your instincts. Your relationships. Your judgment. Your life experience. The things you know because you have lived them: these are the things no algorithm can replicate. These are the foundation of the Human Authority Method™.

AI is the amplifier. You are the signal.

This week, not next month, not when things slow down; this week, I want you to do one thing.


🎬 Ready to Show Up Like the Authority You Already Are?

Book your first hour in The Concierge Office Suites Vlogging Studio.

Walk in. Sit down. Hit record. See what it feels like to finally look and sound like the authority you already are.

👉 Book your Vlogging Studio hour → theconciergeofficesuites.com


Are you an event planner or organization looking to bring The Human Authority Method™ to your stage?

Denise Reed is available for keynotes, workshops, and conference sessions for business professionals in every industry.

👉 Speaker inquiries → DeniseReed.is


Episode Details

Episode: Just a Point of View — Season 3, Episode 5

Title: Call of Duty to C-Suite: What AI Learns About Conversations | JAPOV S3 E5

Series: Project Voice 2026 — A Decade of Conversational AI

Guest: Mike Pappas, CEO & Co-Founder, Modulate AI | modulate.ai

Event: Project Voice 2026, Chattanooga, Tennessee | April 27–28, 2026

Watch/Listen:

Connect with Denise: www.DeniseReed.is

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/denisereedis/ |

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DeniseReedis

Recorded at:

The Concierge Office Suites, Vlogging Studio in the Republic Centre

633 Chestnut Street, Suite 600 Chattanooga, TN 37450 | 423-266-6388 www.theconciergeofficesuites.com