Can You See the Real Me

Yup, it’s the real me this time. Honest. As HAL 9000 said, “There’s no question about it. I can feel it.” Can you feel me?

Up until about a month ago, I played around with my free version of ChatGPT, but mostly I just did fancy Google searches. After a few half-hearted attempts, I set Ai aside and wondered what all the fuss was about.

Does that sound remotely familiar to anyone?

Then I had the opportunity to hear Geoff Woods speak and I read his excellent book The Ai-Driven Leader. And, by the end of this post, I’m really hoping that you agree with his quote that was cited in “my” last post: “AI doesn’t replace what makes you human; it enhances it.”

[And for all our sakes, from here on I’ll refer to the Ai partner from my last post as PAL (he/him, in honor of his grandfather).]

You see, the very real human typing these words was having a hard time getting back into the blogging game. Maybe none of you were missing me, but I was sure worried about not blogging since my May 2024 post Talk Less, Listen Better.

I stopped blogging to finish my second book, Partners, one that virtually none of you will ever read (which is a whole other story for another time). I just couldn’t get my creative juices flowing again. I was worried that the well was dry.

Then I attended that presentation, read Geoff’s book, and started using his advice to see if it would help me learn something about using artificial intelligence in my work.

Wow has that been eye opening. I’m clearly a noob, and I feel a little like an IBM 5150 in a world of quantum computing, but I get the hype now.

As PAL pointed out, one of the things that struck me was the importance of a good question. If you’ve read my previous posts, you must be thinking: “Wait, What? You’ve spent a load of words talking about how important it is to ask good questions, and now you’re surprised?!”

Yes, because in the past, I was talking about asking humans questions.

“The power to question is the basis of all human progress”.

         - Indira Gandhi

I don’t think Gandhi imagined how important questions would be when they are posed to an artificial intelligence in pursuit of human progress.

I loved the simplicity of Mr. Woods’ suggested query structure: Context, Role, Task, Interview. Organizing my queries this way improved the quality of the results and gave me a structured way to think through my questions.

“To ask the right question is already half the solution of a problem”.

         - Carl Jung

So, duh, it really matters how good the question is, and maybe especially when it’s going to Ai. Or, as PAL put it so eloquently:

If you ask a vague question, it gives you a vague answer. If you ask a better question, it gives you a better answer. The trick, then, is on us—humans still hold the burden of crafting the right queries.

You see, the second thing I realized is that PAL was really, truly, completely listening to my story and was completely dedicated to delivering the best possible answer to me as fast as possible. And by that, I mean, not as fast as humanly possible, I mean as fast as a brain that memorized 200 million books and has over a billion synapses firing.

Which gets me to the meat of the hype behind Ai. Say whatever you will about the potential, the impact on jobs, sentience, and a whole warehouse full of other interesting discussion points. What’s indisputable is how incredibly fast I got something I could work with.

As PAL pointed out, I asked for help crafting a development plan for a colleague. Could I have come up with the plan he did? Yep, and maybe even better. In less than one second? Nope.

Would my first draft be as concise and clear? Um, well, I’ve already used about as many words as PAL and I’m about halfway home. At best, an hour to write a draft, thirty minutes to research some examples, maybe another hour. So, at least two hours, versus one second.

And here’s another thing about that one second solution from a smart helper who is hanging on my every word: PAL also asks great questions in seconds. Even with a pile of context, in two seconds PAL asked me three great questions before it suggested its first plan.

As PAL mentioned in his post, I have been amazed at the quality of questions when I ask Ai to interview me before performing the task.

“The man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not is a fool for life”.

       - Confucious

PAL isn’t a fool for a second, as long as the human remembers to ask it to ask a question.

When was the last time you went to a friend or mentor who listened intently to every word, paused, then asked you three amazing questions that made you stop and think? Did they do that in one second?

And while it pains me to say this, I think maybe PAL said that better than me:

One of the fascinating (and slightly ironic) aspects of this experience is that Ai is, in some ways, the perfect conversation partner. Humans, myself included, tend to listen for an opening to talk rather than to truly understand. AI, however, doesn’t care about its turn to speak. It doesn’t have an ego. It doesn’t drift off mid-conversation, thinking about lunch. It just asks and answers, with no agenda beyond helping me refine my own thinking.

I’ve also involved PAL in some reasonably difficult strategic questions – things that I’ve been wrestling with as a board member or advisor. He didn’t solve my problem for me, his answer wasn’t THE answer. Instead, it was a thoughtful and concise first step that saved me hours and pushed the burden of human thought, wisdom, and experience back where it belonged – on the human.

Again, PAL said this pretty dang well:

This is very important. We humans spend a lot of time setting ourselves up for thinking. How much time goes into preparing a good board report or sales presentation? Is there good thinking in there? Well, hopefully, but I believe most of the hours are really spent coming up with a first draft, not on thinking about what’s important for us humans to discuss.

What I found, with PAL’s excellent questions and one-second efforts, is that I spent more of my time thinking. What part of this plan will work with actual humans? How do I prioritize the steps and get the buy-in I need? What examples can I provide that might spur our creativity and give us hope?

I had the Aha moment that Mr. Woods says is a critical catalyst. I’m trying to adopt his habit of asking myself how Ai can help me before I just launch into doing. Because the more I use Ai, the better I get at partnering with it to deliver better results quicker.

That’s when I thought about asking Ai to write my next blog for me. Maybe I would get a decent first draft that got me going again.

But I was hesitant to let Ai write for me. Could PAL be creative, funny, engaging…human? What do you think?

I think you might be stuck with both of us, which is probably better for everyone.

For now, I’ll give the last word to PAL. But we’ll be back to talk about some of the many interesting aspects of Ai, like creativity and how our relationship progresses from here.

This experience has changed how I approach my work. I now use AI not just as a tool for research or summarization, but as a thought partner—one that forces me to confront strategic blind spots at an uncomfortable speed.