Hey Everyone,
While I’m on a semi summer break, I’m looking more into applied AI tools to help us be more effective and productive at work.
After some good feedback on our Perplexity guide I’m starting a new series call AI for Non-Techies that will go into some of these applied AI tools. These guides will tend to be short and concise. I don’t want to overwhelm you with jargon but give you actionable suggestions and tips on some of the better AI tools.
AI for Non-Techies: AI Tools for Work 🔎
I don’t claim to be an AI tool expert and I’m not constantly tinkering with these. However I do have some pragmatic ideas to share. My hope is this series will give you the motivation to start finding the best tools yourself for your work needs.
What seems to make the most sense is to automate repetitive tasks that we do at work a lot including for example:
Automate the Things you Do the Most Frequently – The Big Three
Meetings
Emails
Search & Research
Doing this well in our with our own individual BYOAI and usually doesn’t need our team or place of work to opt-in either. 78% of AI users are engaging in BYOAI: Bring Your Own AI.
Automating MES; meetings, Emails and search/research can save us likely quite a few hours every week not just of time, but the cognitive load. I’m not sure it’s useful to think in terms of productivity here per se, but reducing friction at work – just like remote work reduces a stressful commute. It’s not just the time saved, it’s the stress that’s alleviated.
Repetitive tasks slow us down and hurt our morale, makes us feel tired more easily
How we use AI to help us process Meetings, Emails, Search and other common daily routine tasks can make us happier at work, and therefore more productive.
Think of using AI tools to do work a four day work week, where you can take more breaks each day to work on higher impact things.
🚧 Removing Barriers to Adoption
Ben Tossell of Ben’s Bites noted recently that he’s noticed some patterns in low AI tool adoption at work (I cannot vouch for these in your life but they are interesting to consider):
Here is the list he shared on X:
New AI models and apps every week (hard to use them all)
Employees afraid that ai will replace them if they use it
Concerns about privacy, security, and reliability
Employees reluctant (probably lazy) to use AI
Keeping up with the super fast changes in AI
Convincing bosses AI workflows are worth it
Bias against AI and fear of job replacement
Spending too much time automating tasks
Budget constraints and outdated tech
Ensuring responsible AI development
Perceived legal and perceptual risks
Staying on the cutting edge is tough
ChatGPT not being “good enough”
Policymaker accountability issues
Misunderstanding AI capabilities
Lack of R&D budget
Data privacy issues
Security worries
Removing barriers to adoption, can help you find the BYOAI swiss-knife of productivity that can channel more efficacy at work. Most often, the benefits of AI tool adoption outweigh the cons.
🕒 How much Time do we spend on MES
Employees spend an average of 31 hours per month in unproductive meetings. There are fairly significant variations based on role, industry, and organizational practices.
The average person spends just under two hours per day checking and responding to emails. This includes sorting through the inbox, reading through email threads, and composing responses. That’s 42 hours per month.
On average, workers spend approximately 1.8 hours per day searching for information. This equates to about 9.3 hours per week. That’s 37.2 hours per month.
So here we find the average worker is spending 110.2 hours a month on these repetitive tasks. Many of us spend much more.
Solving even just one of them with the best associated tools means a significant chunk of our cognitive load is lifted. As of 2024, I think AI tools are likely the most mature with augmenting employees with how they handle Meetings.
In this article we’ll list some of the top AI Tools for Meetings to try.
We’ll also list some of the best overall tools for your BYOAI toolkit for work.
I encourage you to think about what use-cases might work the best for you at work and find the best AI tools to meet those needs. For most employees just doing Meetings, Email and Search better can go a long ways.
🎯 Most Useful Types of AI Tools at Work? 🤔
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