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The sudden rise in popularity of ChatGPT fueled the recent surge of interest in AI-driven workflow solutions, but the technology has been pervasive in our lives for years in the smartphones we can’t put down and the virtual assistants we talk to in our homes.
If you’re like most individuals, you don’t fully grasp the power and possibilities of AI. You’re apprehensive about using the technology or don’t understand how to tap into its true potential. That’s unfortunate, because plug-and-play AI-driven solutions can significantly enhance your daily productivity and allow you to reclaim hours of your work week.
Katharine Loucaidou, M.Ed, a strategic mindset and business coach, wrote the book “AI Secrets for Unstoppable Business Success & Life Hacks” to bridge the gap between the perception and reality of AI.
“AI’s predictive analysis capabilities empower us to make informed decisions quickly, bypassing the need for extensive manual research,” she said. “It marks a significant shift from a reliance on shared information to the creation of new intelligence to guide critical decision-making processes.”
These seven AI-driven platforms can free you from mundane tasks so that you can focus on more critical responsibilities.
“You’ll have more time to focus on making meaningful improvements to your workflow,” Loucaidou said. “I use these solutions every day and can vouch for their effectiveness. They will allow you to work smarter, not harder.”
Monday.com automates task management. The project management tool organizes your daily responsibilities, allows you to assign specific tasks to members of your team and presents the information on an intuitive dashboard.
You create virtual task cards for individual projects, establish milestone deadlines and program the system to provide weekly or bi-weekly reminders. The system automatically tracks the progress of the project, sends reminders to team members about upcoming tasks that need to be completed and prompts them to input the progress they’ve made on their assigned responsibilities.
The program streamlines communication; everyone involved in a task can view and update their status directly on the dashboard. Instead of spending time calling or emailing colleagues or scheduling meetings to check on the team’s progress, you simply log into the dashboard to see the latest updates. The platform ensures everyone is aware of their responsibilities and progress, which increases accountability within the team without you having to constantly monitor their incremental progress.
“You can also use the platform to create tasks and alerts for your personal life on a private dashboard,” Loucaidou said. “That’s no small advantage when trying to balance home and work lives that feel busier than ever.”
Feedly is a news aggregator that helps you stay current on industry trends, global news and stock market movements. The platform allows you to customize a personalized news feed according to your general interests, specific topics and how frequently you want to receive updates.
“Opening Feedly at the start of each day saves me valuable time that would otherwise be spent scouring the internet for information that’s relevant to my business,” Loucaidou said. “It’s a remarkably efficient way to stay informed without filling your email inbox with a series of news alerts that can become overwhelming and lose their impact.”
SaneBox.com and Spark are AI-based email management tools that automatically organize your emails into categories you create, such as social media alerts, messages from marketers or sales contacts, high-volume correspondence, newsletters and personal connections. For instance, emails from colleagues or outside contacts that you connect with frequently are filtered for easy access.
“The tool prioritizes important emails based on your interactions, ensuring they remain at the top of your inbox,” Loucaidou said. “What’s particularly impressive is its ability to generate suggested responses to individual messages and automatically check your linked calendar when someone asks about your future availability.”
Spark allows you to set the level of AI integration based on your preferences, giving you full control over the email management process to suit your workflow needs.
IBM Watson provides predictive analytics capabilities for decision-making, an invaluable benefit when quick decisions need to be made based on gathered information. For example, gaining insights into the sales performance of a specific device might require you to spend several hours analyzing numerous reports. IBM Watson allows you to upload the reports and request summaries of the device’s current metrics, projected performance in the next week and anticipated trajectory over the next three months.
“Within moments, the program provides a comprehensive predictive analysis, saving you significant time and providing valuable insights for decision-making,” Loucaidou said.
Tableau takes data that you input and automatically generates charts, graphs, spreadsheets and dashboards, eliminating the need to manually produce exhibits for reports and presentations. The platform also updates the data and visual presentations at defined internals and lets you share the information with just a few mouse clicks.
Zapier seamlessly integrates information across different software systems within your company. For instance, when a potential new client engages with your company’s website, digital ad or social media posts, Zapier ensures that their information is automatically transferred to a client management system or newsletter mailing list.
“This automation eliminates the need for manual data entry, ensuring that new contacts are seamlessly integrated into your company’s processes accurately and efficiently,” Loucaidou said. “Zapier also categorizes the lead generation, so you can immediately determine through which medium their information was captured.”
AI-driven technologies provide an endless array of possibilities once you identify where your time is being wasted.
“Pinpointing pain points is at the core of my approach when coaching leaders and entrepreneurs,” Loucaidou said. “Understanding these pain points is crucial because there’s a solution for each one. Sometimes, you might not even be aware of where your time is slipping away until someone prompts you to reflect on it. It’s about recognizing these inefficiencies and finding tailored solutions to address them effectively.”
AI is here to enhance human abilities, not to replace them.
“It eliminates the mundane tasks that bog us down, allowing us to maximize our emotional intelligence,” Loucaidou said. “The productivity boost AI provides has the potential to prevent burnout and allow you to spend more quality time with family or pursue important projects. You’ll realize accelerated growth and be able to focus on opportunities to achieve larger and more ambitious goals at a much faster pace.”
