Last night, in a meeting about our growing dependence on consultants, it hit me: we’re making the exact same mistake with AI.
How do I know? Because I used to be one of those consultants.
Fifteen years ago, I would disappear with a client’s data and processes, reemerge weeks later with a perfect solution, and watch it fail spectacularly. Every single time.
Why? Because solutions don’t come from isolation. They come from the people doing the work.
The breakthrough came when I stopped being the solution person and started asking the right questions. I stopped delivering answers and started facilitating conversations where employees discovered their own. Suddenly, things actually got implemented.
Now, we’re doing the same thing with AI.
We treat it like a search engine; type a question, get an answer and move on. But here’s the thing: if you’re not great at searching Google, your AI won’t be any better. You’re just outsourcing bad search skills to a fancier tool.
AI isn’t a search engine. And just like those consultants, it can either impose solutions or help you think. The difference lies in how you use it.
Right now, I see two camps forming:
• The AI Resisters are still doing everything manually, falling behind while their competitors move at lightning speed.
• The AI Over-Reliers are dumping prompts into ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or whatever new AI pops up, and calling whatever comes back “good enough.” Then they show up to meetings unable to defend their work because they never actually thought about it themselves.
But here’s the truth, AI can work the way good consulting does now. It can help you discover solutions instead of imposing them. But only if you do the thinking first. Just like how I typed this article first by hand, then ran pieces of it though AI to apply some polish.
The world isn’t ready for brain-dead automation yet. And honestly, we need you to keep thinking.
That’s exactly why I started using a persona template, which is a tool that I have relied on for years and recently adapted for AI. It helps clarify your strategy, preferences, and what you hope to gain before you ever type a prompt.
I use it every week to plan meetings: to define what I want to achieve, what I hope to learn, and what my role is in the conversation. When you give AI that same context, you set yourself up for success, just like walking into a meeting prepared.
You bring research. You bring perspective. You bring intent.
And remember, it’s perfectly fine to say, “I don’t know the answer to that. Let me find out.” That’s how learning happens.
As many of you know, I’ve been toying with launching an organizational learning podcast through my YouTube channel, The Improvement Habit. I recently revived the channel and I’m creating a video on AI. It’s a conversation I think we need to have more often.
Drop a comment below and share what’s been working for you, or what you’d like to explore next.
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