5 Ways To Make ChatGPT Work For You (And Overcome Your Fears)

AI and ChatGPT are moving fast and seemingly taking the world by storm. Most people are afraid it will take jobs and reduce the need for real people to do important work. But despite fears, you can leverage ChatGPT and make it work for you.

Leaning into the new technology can put you on the front edge of where AI will go and how you can use it to not only increase your confidence, but also increase your contribution—making you terrifically valuable at work.

Fears and Opportunities

Fully two thirds of people believe AI will replace significant numbers of jobs in the next five years, according to a new poll by CodeInterview. And people believe jobs in marketing, writing and programming are at biggest risk. CEOs seem to agree—with 43% saying they believe AI represents an opportunity for their business, based on a poll by Vistage. Interestingly though, 20% of CEOs say they don’t know how it works. Additionally, only 3% see it as a risk to their business—in contrast to 50% of people who have concerns in the CodeInterview poll—who expect negative effects on society.

When new technology takes hold, your best strategy is to accept it, learn as much as you can and figure out how to use it to your advantage. Tech can do so much but humans are uniquely good at creativity, curiosity and connections—so you have good reasons to maintain confidence in your own (human!) abilities. In addition, invest in your own expertise and experience so you know your area deeply and comprehensively—and you’re able to continually reinvent yourself as things shift and change.

Embracing AI

It seems plenty of people are starting to use AI, with 19%-20% of people saying they use it once a week or several times a week, and 10% using it once per month, according to a poll by Word Finder. These are the early adopters, for sure, with almost half of people (46%) saying they’ve only used it once or twice in total.

According to Word Finder, those who are most likely to have used ChatGPT are in fields of technology, healthcare and marketing with those least likely working in construction, business services and education. In addition, about 25% have used ChatGPT for work. In the CodeInerview poll, more than half of new graduates expect to use AI on a day-to-day basis in their jobs.

Among those who have used ChatGPT for work, 29% have done so without their employers’ knowledge, according to Word Finder. They didn’t pay a high price for secrecy, however. Fully 68% saw no consequences when employers found out, and 18% were asked how to use it. Only 5% received warnings, 4% were reprimanded and 2% were fired.

Using it Well

When you’re using ChatGPT, it’s important to remember its limitations. Sometimes with little knowledge, you can become overconfident (known as the Dunning-Kruger effect). Instead, you’re wise to be aware ChatGPT is powered by a statistical tool which predicts language without understanding it. As a result, the system can generate incorrect answers. This makes it more useful in situations where a precise answer isn’t necessary or when you’ll use it as a starting point or an informational aid.

Also be cautious since AI is based on humans who ae fallible and biased. According to the CodeInterview poll, 54% believe AI is biased. You’ll need to ensure you check, discern, edit and ensure accuracy for your end deliverable.

Leverage ChatGPT by doing more than just asking a question. Instead, tell it what you want to know—and tweak your request incrementally so you get better and better answers. Also be sure never to input proprietary or personal data as it will become part of the OpenAI system.

#1 – Get Started

You can use ChatGPT effectively to get started. It does a great job of solving the blank-page problem. Get going on something you need to write, create the script for your presentation, generate talking points for a meeting. If you’re in a contracts department, get a first draft of contract language based on your negotiations about responsibilities of each party.

Fully 20% of people in the Word Finder poll used the system to create content. In addition, 14% used it to respond to emails, 11% used it to write code, 10% used it to write resumes or cover letters and 9% used it to create presentations.

#2 – Get Ideas

You can also use ChatGPT to get ideas. For example, if you’re an event planner, you can ask for brainstorms about activities for the gala to benefit a women’s shelter, or if you have to conduct an interview, you can find out what interview questions you should ask. Likewise, if you’re the interviewee, you can get ideas about what the interviewer might ask you.

If you’re trying to create a compelling business case, you can seek ideas for the points which will be most interesting or insightful—giving yourself a starting point for your own development of the content. In the Word Finder poll, 41% of people use the system to generate ideas.

#3 – Get Critiques or Comparisons

The system is also useful for analysis and synthesis. For example, you can input your report and ask the system to give you feedback. Or you can test your new business idea or fledgling innovation. You can compare things (think: proposals) and determine similarities and differences for your assessment, or input a resume and job description to consider potential matches. You can also find the key themes in a piece of writing.

#4 – Get Details or Summaries

Some people have used the system to seek details on potential solutions to problems or even medical challenges or assessment of symptoms. For others, it’s been useful to input a report or transcript from something they must watch or listen to—and obtain a short summary in order to gain efficiencies.

#5 – Get Creative

You can also use the system to have some fun and get creative. A brilliant IT professional faced with the challenge of presenting dry information to a non-technical audience asked that it be written in the style of Yoda. His content was not only memorable, but he was the hit of the meeting.

Learning Through Non-Work Uses

The best way to put ChatGPT to use in work applications is to get to know the system A great way to try, test and experiment is through personal use.

Use the system to get creative writing prompts, translate languages, plan a trip, generate a personal work out plan, find your best new show to binge, identify instructions for a craft or home improvement project or determine the best video game cheats.

You can also identify which deer-proof plants to include in your garden, generate discussion questions for your book group, determine the best homemade food for your allergic dog or even recommend recipes for the few ingredients you have available on the average Wednesday night.

Using the system more will help you identify what it can do, and—more importantly—what you can do with its support.

How It Will Evolve

It’s early in the game, and AI and ChatGPT will certainly evolve. In fact, 73% of experts in the Word Finder poll believe it will increase our efficiency, automate tasks (68%), perform data analysis (63%) and improve accuracy (62%).

Overall, people believe it will become more accurate and efficient, be used more frequently in more industries, become more accessible and be able to perform increasingly complex tasks.

Your best strategy will be to lean in, understand it and leverage it—and to be your very best in your field so you can continually up your own, uniquely human game.