Conversational Generative AI tools entered our lives approximately a year and a half ago. Despite the short time, they have become familiar and are widely used by many. Tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, or Claude have become significant tools for various uses, from writing greetings and planning family trips to designing and creating presentations or writing code to process, summarize, analyze, and distill professional information, to name a few (Read more about the tools-
At the heart of these tools lies Augmentation - the combination of capabilities, or synergistic collaboration between humans and machines. Augmentation is essentially a combination of strengths - harnessing the unique advantages of humans and machines to work together to achieve improved results.
The advantages of machines are:
Information gathering and processing: Machines can collect and process vast amounts of information and data quickly and efficiently.
Summarizing long texts: Machines can condense long texts and extract the main points.
Information merging: Machines can effectively combine and merge information from different sources.
Translation: Machines can translate text into any language, considering specific dialects or contexts.
Data analysis: Machines can categorize and organize content and data (For an example of using this ability in the world of knowledge management, see: Taxonomy in the New Era: Utilizing AI and More for an Efficient and Agile Process).
Synthesis: Machines can combine content segments into complete ideas, including new insights.
Fortunately, humans also have unique advantages
The main ones are:
Cultural understanding: Humans have a deep understanding of culture, society, and human contexts, allowing us to interpret and analyze data holistically and appropriately.
Situational understanding: Humans can understand the context in which they find themselves, allowing for a better overall understanding of the big picture.
Sensitivity to nuances: Humans can identify dynamic situations, sensitivities, and subtle nuances in language and various situations, and adapt to them.
Critical thinking: Humans can analyze information and behavior while raising doubts and re-examining the fundamental beliefs and values on which they are based, and if necessary, understand that they need to be changed and act differently.
Creative thinking: Humans can think outside the box, allowing them to generate new ideas and original solutions.
Emotional understanding and connection: Humans are endowed with the ability to feel empathy, to understand emotional states, which allows them to engage and communicate deeply, based on relationships.
Conversational generative artificial intelligence is the optimal approach for maximizing these combined capabilities, through the dialogue between humans and machines. The human writes a prompt - an instruction, request, or response to the machine, and the machine responds with its creation. The human reacts, and the machine addresses the reaction, and so on. Thus, the conversation creates that Augmentation, enabling achievements that neither side alone could reach.
There are two types of such conversations:
The first, and most familiar, is where humans are the leaders. The human writes a prompt and receives the result created by the machine. From there, one can continue to develop a conversation with the machine to refine the machine's response to his or her needs, expand, delve into certain aspects, generate alternatives, or get examples.
In this type of Augmentation, the skills we need to develop to turn the tools into useful and effective work tools include:
How: How to write good prompts that will express our specific needs and lead to a valuable response from the machine.
When: No less important, and perhaps even more challenging, is developing the skill to identify when to use these tools. In which tasks, job components, or processes can the use of these tools provide added value for us?
Our role in the conversation: To interpret and evaluate the results, lead the conversation in a direction that will help us, apply critical or creative thinking, and identify possible biases.
The second type is a conversation where the machine is the leader. This type of Augmentation is performed through "personalized knowledge agents" or "dedicated agents" like GPTs from ChatGPT or "AI Agents" from Gemini (Google).
In this solution, we utilize the RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) capability and provide a specific response to a knowledge-intensive and thought-intensive process. The agents are specific and pre-trained. They lead the conversation with the human. The machine starts the conversation and presents relevant questions, directions, or suggestions. The human, in turn, responds and develops the conversation. This type of integration is especially effective when we need new ideas, different perspectives, or information in a specific field.
Examples of using these dedicated agents in knowledge work include:
Support complex decision-making processes
Performing audits or preparing for them
Extracting tacit knowledge from an expert
Lessons learned
Software system characterization
Support social worker reviews
And more.
In this type of Augmentation, the responsibility for leading the conversation is not on us, but the way we use them - the prompts we write in response to the machine's questions - partially affects the result we will get.
Conversational Generative AI tools suggest a future where the combination of humans and machines will become an integral part of our daily work. Our ability to implement the synergistic combination of advantages, as described in the article, allows us not only to improve and streamline our work but also opens new possibilities for us. If we learn how to use the tools wisely, and when to use them, we can streamline processes, improve decision-making, and increase creativity and innovation in our work.
The future is still ahead of us!
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