How I Build & Host AI Workshops For Departments & Company Leaders
On The AI Moment, Jonathan and I decided on our first long-form pod that we would break down how to build an effective AI workshop.
You can listen below, or below are my notes for the podcast and my top tips:
Find out the real: State of play with AI
I always ask teams to complete a form to find out where the team is, what progress has been made or where the hurdles are for the team/department
If team members aren’t interesting in AI or are anti AI - it is important to understand and bring out why
To build an effective workshop, you need to know enough about the team, who they are, what they do and the number of attendees
What AI skills do they have now, and where do you need them to go - some companies are looking for productivity improvements, others are looking to cut headcount, others are looking to inspire their team to accelerate growth.
Find out what tools the team use and what tools will help
Help to inspire with a list of good tools
Good use cases for the tools - I always curate a list of tools, a use case and a rating
The ongoing problems the team are hoping to be solved by AI
I have observed if the team or department cannot highlight problems or workflow issues, it will be a real struggle to build out any solutions to help
Move away from just ChatGPT - we all want a one-size-fits-all tool all, but we are not there especially in Product, Marketing & Growth
The important factor: It’s essential to understand what the company wants vs what they actually need - this is often the difference between progressing forward with AI and stalling AI
Collaboration & Exercises are critically important, getting working together, getting solutionising together, getting using tools and prompts together moves from thinking to delivering. You have to inspire and place the workshop members into a work environment, otherwise it’s all theory
Never push too hard or too fast, especially into automation
Homework - I always set homework, as suggested in the podcast, creating “captains and champions” is my go to method to creating an environment and AI culture of ownership and collabroation
Providing supporting documents and workspace specially for this team - so they can share and inspire their colleagues and cross-functional collaborators
Post workshop check-ins are non-negotiable
