Reframing your thinking about generative AI

Generative AI is at the center of attention these days, and you are probably excited to start incorporating this innovative new tool into your work. However, you might also be intimidated by it.

I certainly was. The first time I started a conversation with AI, I was confused because I heard such high praise, yet I asked it a simple question and it gave me an underwhelming answer.

That’s it? I thought, so much for the next technology revolution…

But then I considered, hm…maybe I’m not asking a good question. I started doing some research on how to use generative AI and tried again.

This is when I began to uncover its potential, and how it can work for me.

To help reframe your thinking about generative AI, here are three ways you can use this tool to ignite your creativity, improve your problem-solving, and increase your productivity.

Think of generative AI as your assistant

Generative AI can assist with repetitive, mundane, or lengthy tasks, freeing you up to do more strategic work.

Let’s say you start your day, open your email, and realize that you need to send a customer a reminder about their upcoming renewal. In this scenario, you are not using automation, because it is a unique client, and you need to personally reach out to them.

You have written hundreds of such emails before, but you need to join a customer meeting in a few minutes. You are a little bit stuck and don’t have much time to spend on this task.

Instead of pushing it off until later in the day and letting it bug you or potentially forgetting about it, ask AI to write the email for you. ChurnZero’s Customer Success AI™ was specifically developed for these scenarios.

You’ll still need to lightly edit the AI’s output to make sure the email is customized to your specific scenario and includes the required personalization. But editing is easier than drafting from scratch, and this process takes way less time.

Now you can cross this task off your list and head to your meeting undistracted, already feeling accomplished before you’ve even finished your first cup of coffee.

After your meeting, you might want to send a follow-up email to a customer with a list of topics discussed and action items. This is where CS AI comes to your rescue again. CS AI can draft a follow-up communication directly from a note you have added to an Account profile. You can quickly personalize the message by asking CS AI to change its tone and length.

Reducing the time you spend on boring tasks does wonders for your productivity. By freeing up more headspace, you conserve your creative energy for the tasks that need it the most.

Think of generative AI as your brainstorming partner

As a customer learning and education specialist at ChurnZero, I create a lot of content, and sometimes I get stuck. I want to draft something when I am working on a lesson, but I’m not exactly sure how to say it or what examples to use. I’ve found generative AI to be helpful with putting my thoughts into words.

But to be honest, at the beginning of my journey with generative AI, I was quite frustrated with the tool. I would ask it a question or request a summary or examples. In return, it’d give me ideas that were obvious and unimaginative. After learning more about the art of prompt writing, and with some practice, I realized that I needed to adjust my expectations. I came to understand that content generated by AI wasn’t something I could copy and paste into my lesson; it was a jumping point to come up with concepts and examples for my content creation process.

As with any new tool you use, invest time in understanding how it works. For generative AI, that means knowing how to write good prompts.

In addition, be aware of the tool’s limitations. Always review content generated by AI for accuracy. Generative AI tools are known to occasionally make up resources and produce nonsense. This is sometimes the result of a bad prompt, or how the AI model was trained.

For example, some AI tools were “trained” in 2021 based on data available at that time, and then released to the public a year later. If an AI tool’s training isn’t kept up to date, the information it generates can be outdated or incorrect.

The bottom line is that different AI tools have different limitations. Take your time to understand a tool’s constraints before you begin using it.

Think of generative AI as your teacher

Generative AI can be a shortcut for when you need to learn something new. While we’re not quite at a place where information can be uploaded to our brains like in the Matrix, AI is an exciting upgrade to how we conduct research.

For starters, you can use generative AI to quickly summarize concepts or topics. This is especially helpful when you’re short on time and need to sift through a lot of information or learn a subject matter that’s completely new to you.

To get the most out of your research process, I recommend treating prompt writing as a conversation. Do not expect to get all the information you need from the first prompt you enter. Continue to refine your prompts and ask follow-up questions to get more information.

As I mentioned before, you’ll need to manage your expectations. Don’t think of generative AI in a vacuum but rather as an upgrade to your current processes. When gathering information, you rarely find everything you need in a single Google search or resource. It’s the same with using AI. You may need to refine your prompt multiple times and ask several follow-up questions, but ultimately, it will save you a lot of time.

Generative AI is a complement—not a replacement—to your work

With all its cool applications, you might be thinking, will AI make me obsolete?

Absolutely not. AI is not here to take over your job. However, becoming comfortable with using generative AI will help you stand out among your peers, grow your skills, and advance your career.

In many ways, your journey with AI is personal. You may find it helpful for certain tasks, and useless for others. Remember, don’t become discouraged if you don’t get the perfect outcome on your first attempts. It takes time to explore and navigate the near-limitless use cases for this powerful tool. But once you get the hang of it, you open a door to new ways of learning, thinking, and creating.

If you’re a ChurnZero customer, you can discover the many applications for CS AI and other generative AI tools in our Academy lesson.

If you’re not a ChurnZero customer, we invite you to try our free version of CS AI.

In need of an AI primer? Learn what AI is, how it’s evolved, and how it can support Customer Success professionals in their day-to-day jobs in our introductory guide to AI.