“Everyone needs to use AI in their work.”

Simply saying that, and only that, really isn’t good enough.

It’s no wonder so many companies can’t seem to get a return out of this.

Give every person in your company a hammer and say, “Everyone needs to use a hammer.” What’s going to come of that, exactly? Some will take a few halfhearted swings, not really understanding why they were given the hammer in the first place. Others will roll their eyes at the new “hammer trend” they expect will disappear like every other trend, and they won’t even bother.

The hammer isn’t enough. Alongside it, people need materials and a mission.

Every person tasked with AI as a mandate needs a code editor that can integrate with a premier coding model.

Every person tasked with AI as a mandate also needs a small personal space to deploy scripts and web apps they build, as well as a public space they can send their creations to if they deem them useful to the wider team.

And every person tasked with AI as a mandate needs to be given permission: draw upon your subject matter expertise and your institutional knowledge to build things that make your job, or someone else’s job, easier.

Work THAT into your day. Identify an action you can streamline and build the tool necessary to streamline it. Use the time you save with that new tool to look for even more actions to streamline. Build the tool. COMBINE tools. Create whole workflows that take you from start to almost finished and turn hours-long affairs into one-click-and-watch-it-go gifts from the heavens.

Repeat, repeat, repeat.

The efficiencies are real but the approach is wrong.

“I don’t know what for, but use it” sounds like capitulating to hype.

“Choose a straightforward but time-consuming job you do each day and tell the AI to build something that makes it easier” — that is empowering people to actually achieve something with this technology.

It really can be that easy.