A Generative AI Introduction Using ChatGPT

Examples for Professionals in Instructional Design, HR, and DEI

(image licensed to the author)

If you’ve been around Microsoft long enough, you might recall an animated paperclip that would offer help for applications such as Microsoft Word. That’s a primitive AI but illustrates the generative AI experience.

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) is a tool to generate unique answers by accessing multiple data sources. The experience might appear similar to a search engine, but that analogy doesn’t describe its power.

Suppose you wanted to understand a concept. You might ask a friend to define the concept and then follow up with probing questions to develop a deeper understanding. You do the same approach with generative AI but with artificial intelligence rather than a friend.

Here’s the cool part: instead of using database queries that must follow a particular syntax, you ask questions or make requests using regular language. The AI figures it out. Even cooler, the more details you provide, the better your results!

ChatGPT

ChatGPT, aka chat generative pre-trained transformer, is a generative AI chatbot. If you visit a vendor’s website, you might see a chat window with a pop-up message asking if you need help. That’s a chatbot…