The Arrival of ChatGPT-4

The release of ChatGPT-4 in March 2023 marked the moment when AI shifted from a futuristic idea to an everyday tool. Less like a gadget and more like a partner, ChatGPT and other AI Agents (such as Gemini and Copilot) seemed able to reason, explain, create, and assist in a way we hadn’t experienced before.

Only a short time later, AI’s impact is felt in almost every corner of business life. Innovative AI-powered services are transforming the way businesses across the world operate, internally and externally. From day to day, many of us are using AI to automate a range of routine tasks, such as drafting emails, reports, presentations, summaries, or proposals; brainstorming ideas and planning projects; writing or debugging code; and generating market research or competitor analyses.

Confession: I used ChatGPT to draft those two paragraphs for me!**

What About “Real” Communication?

So, are great communication skills becoming obsolete? We expect to be confronting this question again and again in the coming months and years. We believe the answer to be “yes and no”.

“Yes” because there is enormous potential for AI to help us to be more productive in our communication. We already use AI extensively for drafting and proofreading. It can help us make our documents easier to read. It can help us edit longer texts into shorter formats — for LinkedIn posts, for example. At MSB Executive, we think this will be just the beginning. Over the coming year we’ll be looking for new ways to use AI tools in our written communications.

On the other hand, there are risks in becoming overly reliant on AI agents. We’ve seen these risks play out in written communications. AI is prone to factual errors, hallucinations and jarring problems with tone. Placing too much trust in AI has led people to miss these and other failings. In spoken communications, problems have arisen when people can’t defend a report they have “written” with a bit too much help from an AI Agent.

There is a great opportunity for those who can make use of the huge productivity gains of AI and add to these their ability connect, engage and inspire an audience. It’s going to be harder to prove you have an analytical edge over a well-trained AI Agent. But if you can build rapport, listen deeply, tell stories and inspire your audience, we believe you can stand out more than ever.

This theme will be a major undercurrent of our work as we enter the AI Age. We’d love to hear your thoughts as we go along. After all, we are all learning together. Where has AI made your communications more effective? Where would you like AI to help more? What communication skills do we need to succeed with AI all around us?

We’re looking forward to the ride.

** The results were useful up to a point, but even after a few adjustment prompts, the text wasn’t quite right and wasn’t quite me. I made edits until I was satisfied with the length, word choice and tone — until the words felt like my own.