Ever wish you could get through your to-do list faster while still delivering high-quality work? Good news: AI can help – but only if you know how to use it correctly.
I’ve spoken to thousands of business leaders, sales professionals, and teams about AI, and I see a common pattern. Some people expect AI to do everything, while others don’t trust it to do anything. The reality? AI is a powerful tool, but it works best when it works with you, not instead of you.
That’s why I teach the 20-60-20 AI Collaboration Equation – a simple, effective way to leverage AI without losing the human touch. Think of it like the perfect partnership: AI does the heavy lifting, but you guide the process and polish the results.
Breaking Down the 20-60-20 Equation
First 20% → You → Set the Strategy
To get the most out of AI, you need to start strong. This first 20% is where you set up AI for success by choosing the right tool, crafting a solid prompt, and ensuring quality control. Here’s how to do it step by step:
▷ Step 1: Choose the Right AI Tool
Not all AI tools are created equal. Different tools excel at different tasks – ChatGPT, for instance, is fantastic for content generation, while Perplexity is great for deep research and sourcing credible information, and Claude is great for deep contextual understanding. I’ve put together a detailed guide on selecting the right AI tool for your needs – check it out here.
▷ Step 2: Craft a Strong Prompt
Once you’ve chosen the right tool, the next step is crafting a strong prompt. This is where my PREPARED Prompting Framework comes in. This framework ensures that you give AI the best possible instructions for high-quality results. You can read the full breakdown here, but here are a few of the key components to focus on:
- Persona: Define the AI’s role. Example: “You are a seasoned marketing strategist specializing in social media campaigns.”
- Explain: Provide context and background. Example: “Our new product is an AI-powered project management tool designed for remote teams.”
- Aim: Make sure you explain your ultimate goal for the output as that can also help to focus AI in the right way. Example: “The goal of this LinkedIn post is to reinforce our brand recognition and to encourage engagement on the post.”
If you’re looking for a great starting point, try this prompt: Create a week’s worth of engaging LinkedIn posts for professional networking.
When you give AI clear, structured prompts using this framework, you get dramatically better results. But remember – AI is like an intern. It’s eager to help, but it needs clear, step-by-step instructions to perform well. Just like you wouldn’t expect an intern to read your mind, you can’t expect AI to know exactly what you need without guidance.
Give AI the right tools and training upfront, just like you would with a new hire. Define the role you want it to play, provide detailed examples, and be explicit about what you expect in the final output. AI works best when it has a framework to follow – otherwise, it may return vague, incomplete, or even incorrect responses.
I dive deeper into this idea in my article here, where I break down exactly how to get the most out of your AI assistant by treating it like an intern you’re training for success.
Middle 60% → AI → Do the Heavy Lifting
This is where AI shines. It:
- Drafts emails, reports, social media posts, proposals, or anything else text-based
- Analyzes data, summarizes trends, and organizes information
- Generates ideas, outlines, and structured content in seconds
Let AI do the bulk of the work, but remember – we are shooting for a first draft, not the final version. No AI is perfect (yet).
Final 20% → You → Review, Edit, and Polish
Now comes the most critical step – making sure AI’s work actually meets your standards. If the first 20% is about setting AI up for success, this last 20% is about making sure it doesn’t trip at the finish line.
Remember, AI is your intern. It’s eager, it works fast, and it can produce impressive results – but it doesn’t always get everything right. That’s where you come in. Your job is to:
- Check for accuracy: AI gets things wrong sometimes – no surprise there. Double-check data, ensure logical flow, and make sure everything aligns with your standards.
- Consider ethics and inclusivity: AI, as powerful as it is, sometimes reflects human biases. Be mindful of potential assumptions about gender, geography, or industry. Check if the language and visuals reflect diverse audiences. Avoid jargon, idioms, or references that might alienate readers outside specific groups.
- Ensure clarity and coherence: Sometimes AI-generated content sounds great but doesn’t fully make sense. Read it aloud to spot any awkward phrasing.
- Adjust for brand voice and tone: AI doesn’t inherently know your company’s style or audience preferences. Make sure the tone matches your brand. If you haven’t trained AI for your voice or included it in your prompt, you’ll need to do that here.
- Personalize where needed: AI can draft a solid foundation, but a personal touch makes all the difference. Bring in your insights. Tell personal stories, share relatable anecdotes, and weave in brand personality. AI doesn’t know your audience like you do – this is your chance to shine.
Skipping this step is like letting that intern send an important client email without reviewing it first – risky! Taking a few minutes to refine AI’s output ensures that you get high-quality, professional results every time.
Advanced Pro Tip: Moving to 10-80-10
As you improve at working with AI (crafting better prompts, incorporating custom instructions, incorporating examples, etc.), you’ll find you can start to shift the ratios even more in your favor. Once you have strong prompts and templates, AI can do even more of the work – pushing you toward a 10-80-10 split, where AI handles 80% of the workload.
For example, I worked with a sales team who initially spent 30 minutes crafting each outreach email. They were quickly able to get to the 20-60-20 level but after further refining their AI process it’s probably closer to 10-80-10 today.
Their predefined AI prompt with training data generates each personalized email in seconds with just a few inputs such as prospect name and website. Technically, they are still doing their 20% with a well-thought-out, reusable prompt template, but to the user, it feels like just 5% or 10% since they are simply filling in a few blanks.
AI then does research and writing. Again, with the right custom instructions, prompts and training, even the first response from AI will be better. This means less editing is needed on the other side.
That’s time back for calls, relationship-building, and closing deals.
Try the 20-60-20 Rule Today
Want to test this out? Try a prompt in ChatGPT – maybe writing a LinkedIn Recommendation for a colleague (you know you should have done this already anyway!).
Write a really strong prompt (use the PREPARED Prompting Framework to help) – this is that first 20%. Then see what kind of output you get (letting AI do its 60%).
Your goal isn’t to get a perfect output (though that would be amazing, it’s unlikely on the first try!). Instead, you should get output that makes you think, “hmmm…that pretty good! I’d give that an 80%!” Then, you add in all your human awesomeness and tweaks to get it to 100%.
Keeping my 20-60-20 Rule in mind, you’ll be surprised at how quickly you can create high-quality content.
Final Thoughts: AI is Your Productivity Partner
AI isn’t about working harder – it’s about working smarter and more efficiently. The 20-60-20 rule ensures that you stay in control while letting AI accelerate your workflow. And if you’re thinking, “I need to get my team up to speed on this,” – well, that’s exactly why businesses bring me in for keynotes and training sessions (hint hint!).
So, are you ready to collaborate with AI like a pro? Let’s talk. And in the meantime, start using AI to take the busywork off your plate – because you’ve got bigger things to do.
