How To Use AI To Make You Better At Your Job

There’s a lot of debate on the interwebs right now about whether AI is going to eventually make people completely irrelevant in the workplace. While some fields will likely inevitably be taken over by AI (in the same way self-checkout replaced some store clerks), the advent of AI doesn’t mean we’re about to start living in the Matrix anytime soon. Nor does it mean we’re all about to be replaced by bots tomorrow. 

Instead of viewing AI as something that’s going to outright replace you, view it as a tool to make you more efficient. I work in marketing, which involves writing a lot of both short and long-term content, across a wide array of mediums. I’ve played around with ChatGPT a fair bit over the last few months to see how it can supplement my work, and I’ve found that while it can be helpful for more straightforward problems and idea generation, the content it generates still misses the specificity and flourish of a human hand. 

AI is your assistant, not your replacement. With its help, you can spend less time on menial tasks and more time doing the things you enjoy at work or things that require more creative brain power. Welcome to the not-quite Matrix, where you are the boss of AI, not the other way around. 

Start Small

If you’re completely new to AI or have been avoiding ChatGPT because you find it overwhelming, then start small. Don’t go into it with any expectation besides adventure and fact-finding – this is just so you can get comfortable. Simply open a ChatGPT account (the basic account is free) and play around with it for a while. Ask it questions like you would with Google, ask it to tell you a story, or ask specific prompts related to your field of work. The possibilities are endless. Play around with different inputs until you reach a place where you feel more comfortable.

Pawn Off the Menial Stuff

We all have tasks we tend to avoid throughout the day. Maybe it’s an email you’re not sure how to write, a cover letter for a job application, or a speech you have to deliver at a company meeting. If you’re having trouble writing something, AI is a great resource. You’ll need to supply it with some key information first, such as a prompt like: “Write a cover letter for an Associate Underwriter position at a small life insurance company.” The more specific you can be, the better because if you’re short on details, you’ll get a pretty canned response. 

A word of warning: The first draft ChatGPT spits out will likely need some (or a lot of) editing, and you’ll need to input more specific information. You can also adjust the tone or ask it to write something more professional or more casual, depending on the circumstance. AI won’t get you to the final version right away, but it will give you a great starting point. 

Task Management and Calendar Organization

A recent study found that AI might be better at time management and task prioritization than humans. As someone who tends to procrastinate, the results of this study do not surprise me. If you’re struggling with managing your time or just looking at your calendar stresses you out, then ChatGPT can help. 

You can tell ChatGPT what tasks you have to accomplish that day and ask it to generate a schedule for you. You can have it prioritize more important tasks over less important ones. Bonus: ChatGPT will even tell you if your schedule is workable or not based on time constraints. That’s one savvy digital assistant!

Idea Generation

When you’re stuck in an idea rut, AI can lend a helping hand. This is especially true for creative types because we all suffer from writer’s block sometimes. Let’s say you work in fashion and need some blog post ideas for your website, but you’re feeling drained and can’t think of any topics. Have no fear, AI is here! 

To test this one out, I asked ChatGPT, “What are five blog post ideas for a fashion company, specifically about summer fashion?” Here were its suggestions:

• Top 10 Summer Fashion Trends

• Summer Fashion For Different Body Types

• How To Accessorize This Summer

• Summer Fashion For Men And Women

• How To Style Summer Clothing Items In Different Ways

You might not like any of the ideas it gives you at first, and that’s okay. Simply ask it for more, or try a different prompt. Even if you only end up using one idea, or one of the generated topics spawns a different idea in you, that’s great! You’re simply using AI as a way to get the creative juices flowing. 

A Second Opinion

Having someone else to bounce ideas off of is one of the bedrocks of innovation. You can come up with great ideas on your own, sure, but outside opinions are what sharpen good ideas and make them truly great. In the era of remote work, we often find ourselves siloed in the workplace. A group brainstorming session just doesn’t have the same pizzazz via Zoom. 

If you’re looking for someone to bounce ideas off of or go deeper into a certain topic, try turning to AI. Let’s say you’re putting together a business plan or project proposal. You could paste your working document (or parts of it) into ChatGPT and ask it to make it better. You can even ask it what issues it foresees with your idea or different avenues to go down that you might not have thought of before. 

How Not To Use AI

Remember, we’re using AI as a starting point, not an endpoint. If you’re a student, do not use AI to write an entire essay, then hand in that verbatim essay to your teacher. You’re in school to learn, and you can’t do that if ChatGPT is writing everything for you. Also, there’s a good chance your teacher will figure out what’s going on, and you could get into a lot of trouble. 

Similarly, if you’re using AI to help you write anything that’s public-facing, like a blog post or article or speech, then copy and paste is not your friend. You don’t know where ChatGPT is sourcing this content from, and it could rip entire paragraphs from your competitor’s website or from an article someone else put a lot of effort into actually writing. 

There are already lawsuits that have been filed due to AI infringing on copyright laws, and you do not want to be on the end of one of those. AI is an idea generator, not a generator of polished copy. Use it wisely. 

Closing Thoughts

No one knows exactly what the future holds for AI, nor can anyone foresee with absolute clarity all of the ways it will change our lives. Instead of getting bogged down in those details and fretting over whether your job will still exist in a few years, focus on what AI can do for you right now. One thing we can say for certain is that more and more companies are going to begin incorporating AI into everyday work, and you will want to stay ahead of that curve.

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