Generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Google Bard, and others have made huge waves over the past year, and for good reason. These tools can do some really cool stuff.
A lot of the viral headline type applications aren’t particularly useful for business. It’s cool that ChatGPT can write a Shakespearean sonnet about microwaves, but it’s probably not going to change your daily routine.
But some professionals are finding novel and tremendously helpful ways to use these tools. This week, we’ll show you three ways you might start leveraging these tools in your daily business routines and workflows.
One Big Caveat
Now all of this comes with one gigantic caveat: ChatGPT isn’t sentient. That means you shouldn’t trust it to make decisions or give advice that would be obvious to humans. Just like you wouldn’t take Siri or Alexa’s responses as gospel truth, you shouldn’t assume everything in generative AI responses is completely accurate or actionable.
That said, the strategies below can be generally helpful in many situations.
(Just don’t trust its opinions on “aromatic water mixes”…)
1. Trend Detection
First up is trend detection: spotting the latest trends in any industry is time-consuming work, and it’s next to impossible to be the first one to notice what’s happening.
ChatGPT or other generative AI tools can scour the web much faster than you can. Assuming you’re using a tool that’s operating based on current data, that tool could be able to discover the next trend faster than you otherwise would.
A prompt like “provide a short analysis of the latest trends in [your industry].” should be a good place to start.
Remember the caveat: if the results are stuff you’ve known about for months, or if they seem unsupported by other information, think twice before betting the company on the prediction. But sometimes you’ll get information that’s both accurate and something you didn’t know before, and this can be a big help.
2. Productivity Advice
These tools are unlikely to invent an entirely new strategy for business productivity. But they are exceptionally good at distilling down advice from dozens (if not hundreds or thousands) of sources. Ask your favorite AI chat tool for three or four new ways to improve some aspect of your personal routine or business workflows and see what pops up.
If the advice seems generic or off-topic, try refining your prompt or clarifying for the bot what it is you’re looking for. Often the results will get tighter the more information you provide.
3. Summarize Complex Concepts and Events
You’re not an expert in everything — none of us can be. But as a business leader, you need the ability to understand (at a high level at least) all sorts of concepts, industry news, events, and so forth, even when that information isn’t in your area of specialization.
These chat tools can do a great job at summarizing complex concepts. You can literally ask one to explain the Theory of General Relativity at a level appropriate for a kid who’s eleven years old.
Run into a tech term you can’t quite get your head around? Ask Bard to explain it to you at a fifth-grade level. Not sure how a particular economic development is going to affect your industry? Same thing.
Research Assistants, Not Robot Writers
We think the best way to think of these new tools is like personal research assistants. They’re great at churning through information and providing understandable insights from it. If you ask them to write technical documentation or your next sales pitch, you’re on risky ground. But asking them to help you work smarter and faster? That can be a great strategy!
That’s it for this week but be sure to reach out if you need a managed IT partner or any other help with your IT infrastructure!