One of the most practical ways I like to think about AI tools like Copilot, ChatGPT, or others is not as “technology” at all, but something much more familiar like a training assistant sitting beside me while I work.
Not doing the work for me, and not replacing my thinking, but helping me move faster, and get to the answer without all the detours.
The old way of figuring things out
If you’ve worked with systems for a while, you’ll know this feeling.
You know something should be possible. You’re sure there must be an easier way. But actually finding the answer can take far longer than it should.
That often means clicking through menus, searching help articles, trying different wording in Google, and sometimes ending up in forums or manuals that are either too technical or not quite relevant. In many cases, the answer is there somewhere, but the effort to find it becomes the real barrier.
That friction is what AI is starting to remove.
Instead of searching through layers of information, you can simply ask the question and get a response in plain English, often tailored to what you are trying to do in that moment.
For me this means instead of carrying on doing things the old way because I’m just too busy to learn the new way, I can now quickly get an answer and start to form new habits.
AI as an over-the-shoulder guide
This is where it starts to feel like the “personal training assistant”
Rather than stepping away from work to research something, you stay in the task and ask questions as they come up. The AI sits alongside you, helping you troubleshoot, explain, suggest options, and sometimes walk you through a better approach.
In practical terms, this means that instead of breaking your flow, you are supported within it and that small shift makes a surprisingly big difference.
AI assistants are designed to work within the tools you already use such as CoPilot within Outlook, XL and Word - helping you retrieve information, generate content, or analyse data without needing to divert to try and find out how to do something.
How organisations are using this at scale
At an organisational level, it’s the same principle.
Businesses are increasingly using AI tools to connect their internal knowledge, bringing together documents, systems, and processes into something that employees can access in real time. This is set up in a closed system where documents approved by the business are the only ones being accessed for reference – not the whole internet – and the AI does the heavy lifting to filter and summarise.
Instead of expecting staff to know where everything is stored, or who to ask, the AI becomes the first point of reference. Employees can ask questions in natural language and receive answers pulled from company knowledge, policies, and history.
This addresses a long-standing problem in organisations, which is not a lack of information, but the difficulty of accessing the right information at the right time.
The result is not just faster answers, but better use of people’s time, with less reliance on “the one person who knows how it works.”
Cutting out personal frustration
While all of that is happening at an organisational level, the individual benefit is just as important.
This is where tools like Copilot and ChatGPT really come into their own for people like us working closely with systems, processes, and clients.
There is a very specific frustration that comes with knowing there must be a better way to do something, but not having the time to work it out properly. That often leads to workarounds, repeated manual steps, or simply putting up with a process that is not ideal.
AI changes that.
Instead of accepting the workaround, you can ask the question in the moment. You can test ideas, refine your approach, and get explanations quickly enough that it is actually worth exploring.
That ability to experiment without a large time cost changes behaviour. It encourages curiosity, and it lowers the barrier to improving how things are done.
From hours to minutes
There is increasing evidence that AI tools are significantly reducing the time it takes to complete many types of work, particularly tasks that involve searching, summarising, or processing information.
Studies show that generative AI can reduce task turnaround times quite dramatically in some cases, with noticeable improvements in both speed and overall productivity.
Even outside of formal studies, the practical experience is very consistent. Tasks that previously took hours of searching, reading, and trial and error can often be shortened to minutes when you have an AI assistant guiding you.
That doesn’t mean the thinking disappears, but it does mean you spend more time applying knowledge rather than hunting for it.
The real shift
The real shift here is not just about efficiency, it is about how we learn and how we work.
Instead of knowledge being something you have to accumulate before you act, it becomes something you can access as you go. Instead of needing to know everything upfront, you need to know how to ask the right questions.
AI doesn’t replace expertise, but it accelerates how quickly you can build it.
Final thought
Thinking about AI as a “personal training assistant” keeps the role of the human clear.
You are the one making decisions and are still responsible for judgement and context.
But you are no longer working alone when it comes to figuring things out.
You have something sitting alongside you, helping you shortcut the frustration, reduce the time spent searching, and move more quickly from “there must be a better way” to actually finding it.
And in a world where time and attention are constantly stretched, that is a genuinely meaningful shift.