Growth Lab Sunderland: From AI Assistants to AI Agents

The AI agent is knocking. Are we ready to answer the door?

Three years on from the launch of ChatGPT, AI has moved from curiosity to an everyday tool, and now the next shift is already under way. AI agents don’t just respond to your questions; they act on your behalf. That’s a different proposition entirely, and it raises questions every business owner needs to be asking right now.

This special Growth Lab offers a grounded, honest update on where we are with AI in 2026 – and what the rise of AI agents really means for you and your business.

Why you can't miss this

AI assistants helped us work faster. AI agents are starting to work for us – making decisions, running workflows, acting autonomously. Exciting? Yes. Straightforward? Not always. This session cuts through the noise with real perspectives from people who are navigating this right now.

This session will help you

Understand where AI genuinely is in 2026 – and separate the reality from the hype.
Get to grips with what AI agents actually are and how they differ from tools you may already use.
Ask the leadership questions that matter: accountability, trust, and who’s really in charge.
Understand why responsible adoption is a competitive advantage, not a brake on progress.

Meet the speakers

Keynote Speaker & Panel Facilitator

Pascal Fintoni

Managing Director, ArcLight Marketing & Media Ltd | Senior AI & Digital Skills Consultant

Pascal is a digital marketing expert with 30 years of experience and a passion for making AI genuinely useful for real businesses. Since 2023 he has delivered AI conferences, executive briefings, and masterclasses, and personally reviewed more than 400 digital tools. For this event he’ll open with a keynote on AI agents before facilitating an honest panel conversation with local business owners. Clear, practical, and refreshingly jargon-free.

The Panel

We’re bringing together local business owners with first-hand experience of AI adoption – honest about what’s worked, what hasn’t, and what they wish they’d known sooner.

Tony Hardy

Founder and MD of Canny Creative

Founder and MD of Canny Creative, a Blyth-based B2B branding, website and SEO agency. Known for his straight-talking approach and strategic thinking, he helps small marketing teams do big things and turn marketing into a genuine growth driver. Tony also walks the talk on AI, using it to power a smart management dashboard that unifies data from their CRM, Xero and ops tools into a single dashboard.

Laura Pearman

Personal Branding Consultant

With 16 years in entrepreneurship, working with expert female business owners who are ready to be taken seriously. She’s been having honest conversations about AI adoption – the genuine time savers and the bigger questions about what we should hand over. An AuDHD systems thinker, Laura brings a thoughtful counterpoint to blind adoption, believing the human questions must be in the room before the automation decisions are made.

Lee Daymond

Creators Academy and Foresight

Entrepreneur and digital learning specialist who has spent over a decade building businesses at the intersection of technology, skills and creative content. Having successfully exited The Able Agent – a platform that trained over 10,000 property sector professionals – he now leads Creators Academy and Foresight, a content and learning agency. Lee brings a practical founder’s perspective on how AI can unlock efficiencies and build future-ready teams.

Graham Miller

Managing Director of The Good Estate Agent in Roker, Sunderland

Managing Director of The Good Estate Agent, specliasing in residential sales, lettings and auctions across Sunderland. An early adopter of AI business solutions, Graham has overseen AI implementation across multiple business functions and has integrated solutions ranging from Google Gemini to locally developed, bespoke AI tools across several key business functions. 

Your hosts

John Forth and Debbie Simpson

Business Advisers, North East BIC

Debbie and John will be welcoming you on the day, setting the scene, and making sure the Q&A is as open and useful as possible. No question is too basic. That’s a Growth Lab promise.

What is Growth Lab Sunderland?

A free events series from North East BIC, built around real people sharing real experiences – informal, honest, and held at venues across the city. Growth means different things to different people. It might be more profit with less stress, winning back your weekends, or simply feeling more confident about the road ahead. Come with your questions. Leave with something you can actually use.

Book your place