Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips It seems that when we stop doing something, we forget how to do it, sort of. I recently read reports of AI causing “deskilling.” (pronounced de-skilling, not des-killing) It seems that some folks were using AI tools to do something they used to do all the time. After a few months, one […]

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by Dwayne Phillips New tools sometimes allow us to modify the techniques we use. The new tools don’t require modification, but allow it. These kids today, these engineers and scientists under 30, they just … well, they just do things differently. They have new tools (and I have new tools). They work the way the […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Chatbots can answer questions about written pieces. They can be good tools for feedback. I was recently testing several different chatbots to understand which performed better. I fed a 200-page document I wrote into each chatbot and asked them questions. There were several questions which all the chatbots failed to answer. The […]

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by Dwayne Phillips To use AI to write reports requires a person who can write well. Let’s use AI to write our reports or essays or deep research or whatever AI will write for us now. That’s not cheating, that’s using good tools … some disagree violently with that statement. The AI tools are quite […]

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by Dwayne Phillips AI tools are here. They don’t do everything, but they boost productivity. Use the tools. I am old enough to remember a time in the late 1980s when word processors appeared. There were many older managers who were accustomed to writing in cursive on yellow pads with pencils and handing those to […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Sometimes you just lower your head against a wall and push as hard as you can. Let’s begin this little blog post by noting that I attended LSU—not MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Stanford or any of those places known for producing really smart people. At LSU, we may not be able to spell […]

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by Dwayne Phillips When building systems, reduce the amount of intricate typing required by users. Sometimes we forget this and require too much hand jamming. I ran across the phrase “hand jamming” recently at work. I hadn’t heard that in years. I was happy to hear that some people still knew it and knew what […]

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by Dwayne Phillips There are techniques, tools, methodologies, etc. that won’t work—until they do. They shouldn’t work—until they do. What is happening here? Many years ago, we were sitting in a conference room watching a presentation video on a television. The television has a cathode ray tube with a curved glass cover (I wrote that […]

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by Dwayne Phillips These chattering bots can “generate” all sorts of information. Humans must do more and better to keep their paying jobs. I recently sat in a lecture about some worthwhile topic. The lecturer started with, “There are eight aspects to this topic that we will cover in the next ten sessions.” The lecturer […]

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by Dwayne Phillips Reducing the time spent typing on the keyboards reduces the number of interruptions. There are new tools that reduce both. I can type fairly fast. At least I give myself credit for that. Like everyone else, I am interrupted while typing. I could estimate number of interruptions per hour or some rate […]

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