Phil Carey has spent his career turning complex ideas into things people can actually use.
He left school at sixteen and walked straight into Australian broadcasting. Over the years that followed, he worked as a journalist and presenter on some of the country's highest-rating television and radio programs. He learned something during that time that has shaped every project since: the clearest thinking wins, and the quality of a question matters more than the speed of an answer.
In 1993, he founded Cornerstone Media in Sydney. Over three decades, he has written, directed, and produced hundreds of corporate videos for some of Australia's most recognised organisations. That production background gives him something most AI consultants do not have: a working understanding of how ideas travel, where they lose people, and what it takes to make them land.
Phil is now an independent AI consultant and strategist. He works with executives, boards, and leadership teams who want to think more clearly about artificial intelligence. He does not advise on hype cycles or technology roadmaps. He helps organisations ask the right questions: where AI fits, what it genuinely changes, and what risks they are not yet seeing.
The question is the lever. The future is the lift.
In 2024, he published The Curiosity Advantage: How Better Questions Create Better Futures in the Age of AI. The book makes a single, clear argument. The quality of your experience with AI depends less on the technology and more on the mind you bring to it. Shallow questions produce shallow answers. Deeper questions open unexpected possibilities. The compounding loop of asking, listening, and asking again is how real understanding takes shape. It is not a book about prompts. It is about the psychology of working with AI as a thinking partner.
Phil also builds AI tools for specific client problems, which means his consulting advice is grounded in what he has built, not just what he has read about.
He is Creative Director of Cornerstone Media and Chief Operating Officer of Sophie Scott Health, a health communication organisation led by Adjunct Professor Sophie Scott OAM.
He lives in Sydney, where he paints with acrylics, cooks from Michelin-level recipes, and keeps asking questions.
The belief that runs through everything: better questions produce better futures.