3 Ways Generative AI Can Simplify Your Work Right Now

The future of work is a world where human ingenuity and artificial intelligence blend seamlessly. It is not a world of fear and subordination to computers but of cooperation and collaboration with increasingly intuitive AI systems. And to get there, we have to start utilizing the available tools and learning how to work with AI now. At least, that's what my 30 days of experimenting with generative AI at home lead me to believe.

ChatGPT and I have written made-up folklore, drafted replies to pesky emails and DMs, created brand logos for companies that don't exist, and come to agree on a plant-based, pescatarian, heart-healthy grocery list (so much salmon and quinoa).

Contrary to our worst fears, generative AI like ChatGPT has the power to simplify and amplify our work in unprecedented ways. And I'm speaking specifically to creatives, writers, digital marketing and administrative professionals, as well as business development, sales, and executive professionals.

In this future office, professionals are not "replaced"-- they continue to bring their unique skills and honed expertise to work, but instead of Microsoft Word we open a Large Language Model (LLM) chatbot and get to work.

It's a world I can't wait for everyone to build together. If you want to learn how to keep your skillset relevant in this world, here are three ways to get started.

Automate Content Generation

At first I was concerned that the use of chatbots meant writers would no longer have a seat at the table in the corporate world. But after playing around with ChatGPT prompts, I now believe the opposite. It's not as easy as it seems to get a desired response from LLM chatbots, or even to come up with the right question to ask. The same simple prompt, for instance "act like a social media manager for [company name] and right a post about..." will generate a slightly different response, some closer to what you wanted and some dangerously off-track.

It will take that same creativity, critical thinking, and wordsmithing for humans to create the caliber of content with ChatGPT that we'd expect from any paid content writer today. Plus, we'll need a whole new set of AI-related and computer science skills to stay relevant.

Have AI Read for You

Want to get 5 or 10 minutes back in your morning routine?

LLMs have developed to the point where they can understand and write text with incredible accuracy. And with ChatGPT plug-ins, available as Chrome extensions, even reading and summarizing lengthy online text becomes automated.

If your role involves lots of reading, especially publicly-available information like news, research and reports, why not shave off a few minutes with the Summary ChatGPT or Reader GPT extension? In no time (literally) it will read and summarize the text you highlight. Or if you want to show that you've read the text, you can ask the plug-in to deliver "key highlights" from it.

Automate Routine Tasks

Finally, there are a plethora of AI This enables professionals to automate routine tasks, freeing up valuable time for more creative, strategic and high-value work. According to a study conducted by 麦肯锡 (2017), at least 60% of all occupations have tasks people are paid to perform that can be automated to improve efficiency. And that was 6 years ago.

Aside from LLMs, there are our virtual assitants like Alexa and Google Home, algorithms that automate repetitive tasks like data entry, extraction and analysis. And LLMs can be used for more than copywriting. They're ideal for analysing large datasets and extracting insights.

Here's an example for my fellow #socialmediamanagers. AI can already suggest an ideal time to post based on network data, and then automate the publishing of it. But it can also analyze engagement metrics, conduct sentiment analysis, and suggest content ideas. This streamlines social media management, allowing professionals to focus on strategy and engagement.

A word of caution: many companies have blocked ChatGPT over concerns of user privacy and confidentiality. As I've mentioned before, take utmost care when asking ChatGPT for help with tasks. Here, it's best to avoid using potentially confidential information or intellectual property and use generalized prompts.

This is where prompt engineering comes in, or feeding chatbots with the right question to get what you need without sacrificing intellectual property, is in

Embrace AI for Work

While much of our work can be automated with AI, and yes that makes me panic, too, there's a silver lining. For the foreseeable future, generative AI in particular still requires a human to be there operating it with written or spoken inputs. This is what we call "prompting" or "prompt engineering," and it's going to be essential for anyone looking to keep their automatable skills relevant.

If you want to be part of that high-efficiency future workforce, follow along as I learn and share key skills for prompt engineering for non-technically skilled writers.

Still in doubt? ChatGPT wrote most of this article and Bing Image Generator created the header. I edited, fact-checked, and inserted my own experience where needed.