The Supercharged Knowledge-work Sprint
It feels like cheating. But it's not. It's the future of knowledge work.
I'm talking about AI powered knowledge work. I've been teaching it as part of our internal course on Personal AI empowerment that I mentioned in my email: Thriving in the Intelligence Age.
I want to share just one example of the kind of Personal AI workflow that can transform creativity, productivity, and flow at work.?
I call it the Supercharged Knowledge-work Sprint.
It starts with a 'Voice Storm' using ChatGPT in voice mode, and ends with a fully researched and structured Strategic vision and delivery plan for whatever you might be thinking of building, making, or writing.
You'll need a paid account on ChatGPT to do this - if you're not already paying the $20 monthly charge, using this technique just once a month will more than justify your investment.
Here are the steps:
Prepare & Plan
Here you need to pick the focus of your Supercharged Knowledge-work Sprint. It could be a new product idea, an upgrade to your delivery process or an account plan.?
I've used it to build and articulate strategy, write articles and design DIY sounds systems (a favorite hobby of mine!)
The first step is to capture the essence of the brainstorm you want to do in the form of a well structured 'prompt' for ChatGPT. I find that a simple ROLE, TASK, CONTEXT and OUTPUT is a simple but effective structure for this (and many other quick AI prompts you might wish to craft!)
Here's the example I used in class this week. We're focusing on finding ways to leverage AI in our everyday work. Here's what I used:
ROLE:?You're a world class facilitator and solution directed coach from the Erickson school.?
TASK:?Help me brainstorm ideas for using AI in my everyday work. I want you to challenge and expand upon my ideas, but I also want you to bring complementary ideas to the table.?
CONTEXT: I'm an experienced AI user, teacher and builder, but I'm looking for ways to help me super-charge how I collect input and ideas, store and work on them, and generate novel ideas and content. I enjoy the writing process but struggle to focus on my best ideas and rarely re-purpose my content.?
OUTPUT: I want this to be a natural back-and-forth discussion. Let's take turns. Help me explore and dissect these ideas. Tell me when you're ready
You put this into ChatGPT, and the model will come back with a few lines in response. At this point, click the 'Voice mode' icon - it's a black circle in the bottom right of an empty chat input box - as soon as you start typing it turns into the up arrow that submits your chat response, but we want to 'voice storm', so click the voice mode button and let's Voice Storm!
Voice Storm
Now just riff away with ChatGPT. Many people - me included - find this a super easy and creative way to develop ideas. It's much less intimidating than a blank screen or a simple voice memo - that back and forth with ChatGPT voice mode makes for a much more natural process. The model will naturally paraphrase back what you've said, and add ideas or challenges to prompt you to dig deeper.
As you're doing your Voice Storm, feel free to coach the AI on what you want... shorter responses ("Hang on, you're saying too much... I want a much quicker back and forth") or go look something up online ("Search for articles on that") bring additional ideas to the table ("What are others writing / saying about this" or "What am I missing?")
I typically Voice Storm for between 10 and 20 minutes. But I've gone as long as 30-45 minutes before (while out for a walk, or in the hot tub )
Concept Capture
Now we want to pull these ideas together into a coherent structure. I find the reasoning models - like o1 - to be best at this. In this week's class, I used a simple prompt like this:
Based on these notes from a brainstorming session with AI, please pull together a high level plan for how I can upgrade my AI note taking and idea generation. Here are my notes:?
And then I just copy/paste the transcript of my Voice Storm. The easiest way I've found to do this is in the web version of ChatGPT, where you can navigate to your Voice Storm and just select / copy / paste the text of the interaction into another chat window (don't forget to pick the o1 model from the model picker drop-down)
You'll get a decent structure to work with. At this point you can go back and forth to refine the concepts captured from your Voice Storm.
Of course, you can always be more specific in your prompt, using the ROLE, TASK, CONTEXT, OUTPUT format from above.?
Next step is to do some Deep Research.
Deep Research & Synthesis
Now we want to ask the o1 model to create a research brief. In class I used a simple prompt like this:?
Now, turn this into the perfect research brief for OpenAI deep research. Provide context, specific areas to research, and a report format that will help us integrate broader research into this plan. Now, just the research brief please.
Again, you can always be more specific using the ROLE, TASK etc. format.
Then just copy/paste this into a new chat, and this time click the 'Deep Research' button - it looks a bit like a telescope. You'll get a clarification prompt back quite quickly, you provide feedback, and then ChatGPT uses a special reasoning model (apparently it's a version of their yet-to-be-fully-released o3 model) to create a research report.
It will search the web, and interpret what it finds to delve deeper and deeper. Typically it'll search 50-100+ sites, and then structure all of the info it finds into the research report you requested. This can take 5-15 minutes, so grab a coffee, stretch your legs, or check on emails knowing that deep knowledge work is going on in parallel
Finally, take the research report and copy and paste that back into your chat with the o1 model. I use a prompt like this:
OK, here's the response to the research brief. Review carefully and let me know if there's anything missing.
Then I copy/paste the research report in. Depending what comes back, you might want to run some more deep research, or just fill in any gaps yourself.
Create your deliverable
Finally, I ask the o1 model to create a final deliverable, here's the prompt I used in this week's class:
Now, please review this whole chat, and give me a clear, actionable plan to upgrade my AI knowledge work based on these ideas. Give a short introduction and motivation, a carefully structured plan, and details within each step on how to implement. Conclude with advice on how best to get started and complete this upgrade. Provide references for further reading. Double check you've included all the information I'll need to implement.
And boom! There you have it: around 30 minutes to build yourself a novel strategy paper, article, plan or whatever you need to move along an idea, project, product or personal interest.
This isn't rocket science, and I'm sure many of you are using variants of these kind of approaches. Many are not, and they're missing out.
But more than that, doing this opens your eyes to the real impact of AI. What we did here didn't just save a few hours. Yes, it would have easily taken half a day or more to do this by hand the old way, so we got a few hours back: there's your justification for the $20 a month paid ChatGPT plan.
The deeper implication of this, I believe, is that we can develop more ideas, progress more projects, and focus on the bits of knowledge work that we find most meaningful and fun.
And yes, you can do your voice storm while on a walk, in the car or on a train. ?At home, why not jump in the hot tub, recline with a coffee, or stroll around the garden.
The change of scene can actually enhance the voice storm process.
This isn't about 20-30% productivity improvements.. this is about multiplying the impact of every individual, in a way that helps them unleash their creativity and find more fun and flow at work.
Kerry Robinson is an Oxford physicist with a Master's in Artificial Intelligence. Kerry is a technologist, scientist, and lover of data with over 20 years of experience in conversational AI. He combines business, customer experience, and technical expertise to deliver IVR, voice, and chatbot strategy and keep Waterfield Tech buzzing.