Every day that passes it feels like I’m falling behind with AI.

To be completely honest, I’m a bit overwhelmed with all the potential out there.

But when I take a step back, I found that I’m using AI more than I even realized… this occurred to me as I was using copilot to draft my first draft of my performance review self-assessment.

So here it is, hopefully a bit of inspiration for how you can use AI in your day-to-day:

Working in finance can often be a blur - especially this time of year.

It feels like anything that happened pre-budget/plan was ages ago… and I can barely remember what I did.

Which is where Copilot is actually really helpful.

I simply asked it “I’m writing my YE review, remind me of all the impactful things I did for the business and what outcomes it drove”.

No joke, I got back 3 things I completely forgot about along with 7 others that I remembered but didn’t quite know how to frame.

Sure, I got a few things that shouldn’t be included. But I could just filter those out.

Will I get a better rating this year because of this?
Probably not.

But it did save me a bunch of time.

I’ve written about this before, but not all AI is ChatGPT.

Some AI has been around for a while in the form of machine learning.

And machine learning is the mechanism that can apply predictive modeling to business results.

More specifically, PowerBI has the capabilities of building and running machine learning models to produce predictive analytics.

Now, I’m not the technical finance guy who figured this out. But I do employ people who can do this kind of work.

My role (and you should strive for this too) is to know how to apply this and the potential issues when applying it.

Here’s how you can get started:

I’ve used a lot of different automation and AI tools.

I’m personally committed to figuring out 1 that actually adds value to me and is easy enough for me to use as a technical neanderthal.

The one I’d highly recommend is Lindy AI

Here’s how I use it:

And before you think I’m some technical genius, know that each of these is already built in Lindy AI and you just need to turn it on.

It might sound extra, but this is great especially when there are days I’m very busy and have lots of meetings and don’t want to spend time manually prepping.

The key is that this AI tool is doing what I would have already done manually, so it’s saving time.

While I generally think Copilot is the worst AI I’ve used, I do like to use it to ensure I’m not missing something.

Starting a new role about 6 months ago means lots of acronyms and concepts that are new to me.

And previously I would have had a list of these stacking in my OneNote that I ask people to clarify for me. But now I can just drop those in Copilot to kickstart that research.

Does Copilot make stuff up? Yes.
Is that dangerous? Yes.

So you just have to have your guard up when the answer doesn’t quite smell right.

The lesson here for most people is that you can use AI to speed up your onboarding into a new company, role, industry. It’s been very effective for me compared to other roles I’ve personally onboarded into.

I’m sure this is super basic to some of you.

If I’m missing something, hit reply and let me know. I’ll feature it in my next newsletter and can even give you a shoutout (assuming you don’t want to be anonymous).

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