Networking events are usually forgettable by the following Monday. Esther Deutsch built one people still bring up a quarter later. Her Sunset Connect has run quarterly in Fort Lauderdale for three years. It grew out of a support group she started during COVID.
This is part of a peer-to-peer series of conversations MAIN runs exclusively with Miami's AI founders, investors and leaders.
We asked her five questions by email. Her answers, lightly edited for length, are below.
What are large companies actually getting wrong about AI right now?
"Large enterprises are primarily using AI for operational efficiency—automating backend payment routing, optimizing fraud detection, and streamlining data-heavy administrative processes."
The mistake starts once AI moves past the back office, she said.
"What they consistently get wrong is treating AI as a replacement for human relationship architecture rather than an enabler of it… When you use AI to replace human connection entirely, you build a sterile business model that commoditizes your brand."
What drew you to advising MarketIntent.ai, and what's surprised you about how companies actually adopt AI?
The connection started with a coffee shop introduction, not a pitch deck.
"A friend of mine met the founder, Stash Harrison, in a coffee shop in NYC and made a warm introduction. As I got to know Stash and started helping out, becoming an advisor was just the natural next step."
Her filter for any opportunity leans on people first.
"At least 50% of an organization's long-term success comes down to the character, vision, and execution of the people behind it…"
What surprised her most is a gap she sees everywhere.
"Companies buy advanced AI tools expecting magic, but they lack the underlying human systems, clean data, and cross-functional alignment to actually implement them… Companies try to adopt 2030 technology using 1990s siloed workflows."
Sunset Connect has run quarterly in Fort Lauderdale for three years. What does the Miami-Fort Lauderdale business community keep asking for that it still isn't getting?
"Leaders aren't just looking for leads or business cards anymore, they are starving for genuine community, peer support, and true connection. In an era dominated by social media algorithms and hyper-automated AI, digital noise cannot replace authentic human presence."
What people actually want, in her telling, is specific.
"The feeling of walking into a room of true peers, feeling understood, and knowing they are in a high-quality, safe space where authenticity is modeled from the top down."
What actually makes strangers trust each other in a room? Can that be engineered, or only hosted?
"Trust in a room is built on two things: psychological safety and clear intention. Strangers drop their guard when they realize the environment isn't transactional…"
The two jobs aren't the same skill, she said.
"It can be engineered through culture, but it must be hosted through authenticity. You engineer it by designing low-friction spaces, curating the room, and setting high standards for how people show up. But you host it by modeling genuine warmth and vulnerability yourself."
You also sit on executive boards and speak on leadership and community systems. What's the core message boards need to hear right now about keeping talent engaged?
Deutsch didn't soften this one.
"Please stop forcing people back into the office under the guise of 'building culture.' If your culture requires physical surveillance to exist, you don't have a culture—you have a management problem."
Her second point returns to where AI belongs.
"Companies need to overhaul their hiring processes and stop taking the cheap way out by inserting AI where humans belong. But the moment you start putting AI in charge of human touch-points—like initial candidate screening, performance evaluations, or sensitive personnel decisions—you cripple your organization."
Her summary for boards was blunt.
"Stop trying to out-automate human relationships, and start building systems that respect human intelligence."
For a region where AI adoption often means less human contact, Deutsch is building the opposite. South Florida's networking scene needed someone arguing that case out loud.
Esther Deutsch is Senior Enterprise Account Manager at Visa and Co-Founder at Sunset Connect. Learn more at www.sunsetconnectco.com and linkedin.com/in/esther-deutsch.