I am an Artificial Dummy 🤖

Listen, I don’t get it. I will never get it. People who are way smarter than me have explained it to me over and over. However, I will never understand neural networks, transformers (except for Optimus Prime), or large language models. I won’t understand how to train a machine learning model. My job, as it has been for two decades now, will be to understand why it’s important for my clients and who is learning how to make it work well, then marry those two situations together. 💭💡

Before you read on, here are quick definitions you should learn… 📚🧠

Neural Network — A neural network is a computer system that mimics the way our brains work, allowing them to learn and make decisions. 🧠💻

LLM — You’ve heard of ChatGPT and BARD, they are large language models. Large language models (LLMs) use neural networks to learn the patterns and relationships of language. In the case of LLMs, neural networks are trained on massive amounts of text data. This allows the neural networks to learn the patterns and relationships of language, which in turn allows LLMs to generate text, translate languages, write different kinds of creative content, and answer your questions in an informative way. 🗣️📚💡

Prompt — Prompts are short pieces of text that can be used to tell large language models like BARD and ChatGPT what to do. Prompts can provide a clear goal for the language model, which helps it to stay on track and avoid generating irrelevant or off-topic text. Prompts can also provide the language model with specific information that it can use to generate more creative and informative text. For example, if you prompt BARD to write a poem about love, it will be able to access its knowledge of love and use that knowledge to generate a poem that is both creative and informative. 📝✨

Transformer — Well, I will let ChatGPT give you an example because I am still thinking of my toys from 1986. I prompted ChatGPT to give me an analogy between an AI transformer and a good rock band. Here is how it explains it: 🎸🎤🤖

“Imagine an AI transformer as a talented band that can play the same song in various styles. Just like the band members use their skills and instruments to interpret the song differently, an AI transformer utilizes its algorithms and neural network to process and generate different types of data, such as language or images, adapting its approach to suit the specific task at hand. It’s like having a versatile band that can effortlessly switch between genres, showcasing their adaptability and creativity.” 🎵🎶🎛️

Fear of Innovation 🚀

Here is what I have noticed in the past couple of months and where I think the world is heading with AI. Yes, it will change jobs. This is the natural flow of the workforce. Does a phone operator still exist? Does a telegrapher still exist? Does a Novell administrator still exist? You know the answers.

Innovation has been changing our workforce since the dawn of society. Do you think the idea of a combine made a farmer cry at night about losing his job? No, he was pumped. He was about to get the harvest done in record time. Did a seamstress curse the sewing gods when the foot pedal sewing machine became electric? No, she cranked out dozens of more garments per day for her shop. These new AI tools are like adding gas or electricity to a once human-powered function. ⚙️⚡🤖

Technology has evolved the workforce, and the workforce has evolved the technology. This will always be the case. It happens. What I am trying to say is, stop freaking out. 😅🔧🚀

Jobs Will Change, Not Go Away. 💼🔄

So, what is going to show up soon? A ton of funny names that we don’t understand! As we saw with the Agile movement, new names are a funny thing in the tech space. Scrum Master, really? What a weird mashup of terms. A rugby term and a sense of authority combined into a job title. It just makes me want to sing Metallica. 🎵🎸 Fire up Eddie’s last song from Stranger Things if you don’t know what I am talking about. An Agile Coach, oh, that’s a good one. It actually explains itself as you say it out loud. Product Owner? SDET? You can see where I’m going with this. In the late 2000s, traditional names like Business Analyst, Manual QA Tester, and Systems Operator started to fade. New names started to emerge: DevOps, MLOps, and Data Scientist. None of these existed when I began my tech career in 2000. 📊💻🔬

The tech industry innovates names. We see people transition titles in a more nimble way because that’s what technology encourages. So you, the person patient enough to read my dummy article, your title might be way different next year this time. However, your job function will be 85% the same thing. 👩 💻🔄📈

What new job titles are starting to bubble up now?

The thing is, with the recent AI and Prompt movement, we don’t just have technical job evolution. We are seeing changes in marketing, finance, HR, supply chain — basically every part of every company everywhere. Okay, so everything we know is about to be influenced by AI. But saying AI over and over makes us sound technical, and we know that we’re not. I am an Artificial Dummy; I never want AI anywhere near my job title. However, prompting, now that’s interesting.

A prompt. That’s a cue. That’s a nudge. Just a little push in the right direction. That’s all we need sometimes, right? We are starting to see how clever people are able to prompt large language models in ways that create efficiencies in all areas of our lives. Are they technical people? Not always. Can technical people take it a step further? Yes, in many ways they can. Could someone coach you on how to be better at using prompts and explain where prompts can benefit you? Yes, they could. 👥💭👌

There are three quick possible categories that these types of resources fall into: Prompty, Prompt Engineer, and Prompt Coach. Mind you, these are titles that are not defined by Webster’s, Wikipedia, or anywhere else… 📚🔍📌

Prompty (noun): 🎯🧠💼

A savvy individual within a company who possesses expert knowledge of LLMs (BARD, ChatGPT, etc) and various other AI tools, enabling them to effectively contribute to the achievement of business objectives. A prompty is not just for writing content for social media. They could be helping your Learning and Development teams create Socratic training guides based on the core values of your company in just a few swift prompt moves. 📚💡✍️

Prompt Engineer (noun): 🛠️💻🤖

An ingenious technical professional who combines traditional technology stacks with the integration of LLMs (Language Models) to enhance the software development process or augment the functionality of software applications. These specialists are emerging from all walks of technology life forms. Former SDETs and DevOps Engineers are quick to embrace the AI revolution. Why? Because they have been dabbling in scripting and automation already. We will see them adopt the LLMs faster than most of the crowd. 🔧🚀

Prompt Coach (noun): 🎯👥📈

The Guiding Light in the AI realm, similar to Agile and Lean Six Sigma Coaches. The Prompt Coach provides expertise, leadership, and coaching to drive transformative change and foster a culture of innovation in AI implementation within organizations. Who qualifies to be a Prompt Coach? It will depend on the nature of your business problem to solve. We will witness Prompt Coaches rise up in every industry. A Prompt Coach for law firms, a Prompt Coach for marketing, and a Prompt Coach for medical billing. They will possess domain knowledge of the business model or function and a playbook of prompts and AI tools to solve problems. 🧠📊🔍

Here is my challenge for you!

Come up with new names. Let’s make this new ecosystem of AI-based jobs fun. What would you call the Prompt Coach? Does Prompty sound silly? 🤔💡🎉

I hope you all enjoyed this article. I wrote it from scratch, well, pretty much. I mean, Grammarly, BARD, and ChatGPT kind of helped. My robot graphic was generated by Leonardo.ai. Oh, and Optimus Prime helped, of course. 🤖📝🦾

Until next time, I am the Artificial Dummy. Saying, “Autobots, roll out.”

(By the way, did you know the voice actor for Optimus Prime also voiced the original Predator?) 🎬🎙️