Whether you’re excited or peeved by it, chances are you’re using AI at work in some shape or form already. But, are you taking full advantage of the tools on offer, or are you still stuck on the basics? Here are six ways you can improve your AI game at work without sacrificing accuracy, critical thinking, or agency.
Write Better Prompts
People’s experience of using AI is directly proportional to the time and effort they spend on crafting prompts. Sure, an LLM will write a project update out for you when asked, but being vague guarantees mediocrity.
Always provide as much detail as you can to make prompts shine. Set the tone. Define your audience. Establish structure and constraints. This might take longer to set up, but it results in detailed prompt templates you can reuse to save much more time in the long run.
You can go a step further by having the AI cover different angles. Let it point out flaws in a sales pitch that might be obvious to a leery customer. Or, have it find and challenge assumptions you yourself might not be aware of.
Make It a Core Part of Your Workflow
People new to using AI in the workplace assume it’s a tool like any other and reach for it as needed. While that can still take a load off, it’s not as efficient as setting up workflows that work in your favor quietly, in the background.
Let’s say you frequently have to sit through meetings. You could use an all in one AI platform to set yourself an AI agent that transcribes the meeting, creates cliff notes, identifies needed follow-ups, and presents them for your approval each time. On the other hand, teams are finding AI useful in maintaining up-to-date project summaries and developing onboarding materials for new members.
Of course, all of this needs to be done responsibly. On the one hand, this means assuming personal responsibility and using AI both ethically and in ways that don’t expose or endanger sensitive information. On the other, companies themselves need to create a supportive environment. Policies should clearly identify who can use which AI tools for what purpose while building a culture that champions transparency and provides adequate training for optimal AI use.
Go Beyond Summarizing
Having an AI give you the gist of that 200-page legal document is already a massive time-saver, but it’s crude in comparison to the benefits you get if you take it up a level.
Next time, instead of just asking for a neutral summary, have the AI point out key risks or conflicts mentioned, or let it lend an analytical hand by highlighting the decisions this information lets you make. Better yet, you can compare multiple documents and sources and have the AI look for recurring themes, discrepancies, or other factors browsing manually would have surely missed.
You can also put your newfound prompting skills to use here. Create tailored summaries based on needs and stakeholders. Your manager, the CEO, and a customer might all be interested in a project you’re working on, but the information each would find most useful can differ drastically.
Up Your Brainstorming Game
Best AI assistants come up with brilliant ideas so that you can refine them. This is another staple people are underutilizing. Giving you a list of titles or content ideas is nifty, but it’s a spark more than a storm.
Rather than just create ideas, have the AI fight for them or play devil’s advocate to your inputs. Or, present the AI with an idea and have it evaluate that idea from the point of view of an investor or compliance manager. There’s nothing wrong with dreaming big, but AI’s real brainstorming power comes from creating actionable ideas that remain feasible despite actual real-world limitations.
Smarter Task Automation
Automation is regularly one of the first things people try with AI. Success is immediate, so few bother to go past having their AI fire off appropriate responses to generic emails or insert the right Excel formula every time.
Leveling automation up involves identifying processes that are straightforward, repetitive, and easy to verify, and then stringing them together. The comprehensive meeting assistant discussed above is a good example, and so is using AI to review contracts or regularly extract shifts in customer sentiment from new reviews.
Review What the AI Puts Out
While not inevitable, complacency has become a common consequence of the push for greater AI integration. LLMs in particular are prone to presenting everything from facts to gibberish with the same polished confidence.
[A close-up of a vintage typewriter with ‘Write something’ typed on paper.]
You are signing off on the work, so you should always have the final say. Treat AI outputs like the drafts that they are. Take the time to validate any facts and figures or create adjustments if the tone doesn’t quite fit your audience. Also, don’t be afraid to enlist an AI’s help in identifying which parts of the output might be suspect.