Slowing Down to Speed up

One of the surface-level benefits of asking AI is its ability to do it quickly.

Here’s a couple from my recent history:

“Fix this error…” “Write a bash script that recursively finds all of the log files in the given directory and sorts them by creation time into day-named folders.” “Take this CSV file and create an Excel file with the following conditional formatting…”

Less than a minute later, I have what I asked for. I could never do it as fast or as accurately as ChatGPT did initially.

But these are easy, one-offs. The equivalent of having your sous chef stand next to you while you fire directions such as “here, fill this pot” and “get the garlic.”

Although helpful in the moment, that’s not how to effectively use your sous chef.

Unfortunately, I have found myself trying to make AI do complex tasks just as quickly by giving it one-off kinds of instructions. Of course, I don’t get what I want out of it.

For complex tasks, it helps to slow down. Think about what I’m trying to do. Write a better spec. Better instructions. Take more time.

Slow down to speed up what AI can do for you.