Seth Godin recently asked: why open a bookshop when people already have libraries, Amazon, and booksellers they trust? We build infrastructure because it feels like progress. Because we can point to it. Because it proves we’re serious. But the infrastructure itself isn’t the asset. The trust and attention you earn is the asset.

In L&D, we respond in organisations by building bookshops when learners already have everything they need. Our bookshops are the LMS platforms, learning academies, course catalogues, training facilities, etc.

“We need a real LMS. We need proper course structures. We need it to look and feel like learning.”

But learners already have YouTube, AI tools, professional networks, and countless other sources. They don’t need another library; They don’t need your bookshop.

So what asset are you actually building?

Your real asset isn’t the course catalogue or LMS completion rates. Your real asset is which business leaders trust you to solve performance problems. Who pays attention when you identify capability gaps? Whose strategic conversations you’re invited into.

The bookshop model is easier to justify.; we point to usage metrics and can show the platform investment.

But earning trust requires different value articulation. “We’re embedded in strategic workforce planning.” “We’ve shifted teams from activity metrics to performance outcomes.” “Leaders involve us in organisational design.”

The current state is that AI will automate whatever’s left of the bookshop – platform administration, course delivery, and completion tracking. But AI can’t yet be the trusted capability partner who diagnoses why initiatives fail or challenges leadership assumptions.

Are you building a bookshop nobody needs, or the trust and attention that makes you indispensable?

If this question lands uncomfortably, let’s talk.