Enrico Schaefer argues that using AI to make work easier is wrong. Real AI use is collaborative and iterative, requiring careful prompt design and strategic planning. His test: if your workday feels easy, you're doing it wrong. If it feels mentally taxing, you're using AI correctly.
Chapters
Are you using AI to make things easier? Because if you are, you're probably getting it wrong. Here is the thing that is important about AI, is it doesn't allow things to get easier. If it's doing the work for you and you're not doing the work, then yes, things are easier. But that's not the right way to use these tools. The best way to learn how to use AI effectively is to dig in And to engage in what is meaningful AI, which is collaborative, which is iterative, which is never accepting the first answer, which is thinking about the prompt and the prompt sequence, which is strategizing your approach, which is understanding what the outcome is, what the end zone is, and then working backwards from there to figure out how you're going to get from no prompt No prompt, no token chain all the way to the final end zone. What are you going to feed the tool? All these things are really important, and you need to be able to multitask. You need to be able to have several different things going on at the same time as you maneuver through the project back to your work product, look at some background information, finesse the background information, control the context, all these things. are really important. So, if at the end of your workday— and here's the test— at the end of your workday, you feel like it was an easy day, then you're using AI incorrectly. If at the end of your workday, you are intellectually taxed, that you feel like you have really spent a tremendous amount of mental energy, then you're using AI correctly. My name's Enrico. We'll see you next time.
