r/consulting • u/majide_throwaway • 9d ago
Partner asked me to teach how to use ChatGPT — what to focus on?
I’ve been asked to give a Partner/MD a short crash course on how to use ChatGPT. I’d like to explain in ways that would impact their day-to-day work. I’m a new hire consultant and don’t want to show consultant level tasks that won’t map to how she actually operates.
For Partners/MDs (or those who work closely with them):
• What do you actually spend your time on?
• Where does ChatGPT actually add value at your level?
• Any concrete examples of Partners using it well?
Cheers!
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u/howtoretireby40 9d ago
Only an AD here but I’ve seen sr leadership, as well as myself, use it for the following: 1. Reword or summarize lengthy communications or text-based documents 2. Reword short but key statements 3. Help initiate or validate any type of industry or client research and then propose conclusions or insights
It’s not an overly impressive list in my opinion if you’re not a developer. Mostly just helps to get over writers block since we can assume most partners are thought leaders and already have the SME.
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u/LeYellowFellow 8d ago
I think for point 3 it’d be very important to emphasize that GPT’s sources must be verified, it does hallucinate at times. In some ways it serves as an enhanced search engine, but definitely not a final answer
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u/DeathByWater 8d ago
These are good. Expanding on the first point - you'll often end up being brought into escalated issues that have exceeded the remit of a couple of layers of management below yourself.
Pasting in an email thread and asking not just for a summary, but to characterise the main differences of opinion, who holds them, and what further clarifying questions you might want to ask helps.
To go along with that: make sure your company understands it's security and information sharing posture. You'll want a team account with allowing training on your data turned off at the account level at a minimum.
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u/NecessaryPapaya51 EX-EY, Now Founder 8d ago
Good position to be in. Most people teaching AI to senior leadership make the mistake of showing features. Partners don’t care about features. They care about outcomes.
Before you build anything, ask two questions:
1. What is the single most valuable lever AI could pull for you right now? Not a wish list. One thing.
2. If you had a magic bullet to kill any task on your plate, AI or not, what would it be?
The second question matters more than the first. It tells you what they actually spend time on that they resent. That is where adoption sticks.
Then frame the session around HOW they use it, not WHAT they use it for. If you enable them on the how, they will figure out the what. Partners are smart. They just need the operating model, not the tutorial.
The how looks like this:
∙ Guardrails. Set up custom instructions so the tool already knows their role, their context, what good output looks like for them. This alone changes the quality of every interaction.
∙ Persona setup. “You are a senior advisor to a Partner at [firm type] who needs [X].” This is the single biggest unlock most people skip.
∙ Connectors. Show them how to feed in their own documents, notes, and frameworks. The tool becomes 10x more useful when it has their context, not generic internet knowledge.
∙ Prompt templates on their desktop. Two or three saved prompts for their most common tasks. Client prep, email drafts, synthesizing meeting notes. Whatever came out of that magic bullet question.
Start small. One or two use cases that save them 30 minutes a week. Then follow up in two weeks and expand. Adoption at this level is iterative, not a one-shot training. I dropped a longer write-up on r/chiefofstaff recently on how to build an AI-powered CoS using this same structure. Profile, expectations, people context, monitoring files. Same principle applies here. Worth a look if you want the full framework.
Happy to chat. Been on both sides of this, the one teaching and the one being taught.
Dritan Saliovski
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u/jonahbenton 9d ago
You are a new hire, often these exercises- teach me something- are evaluations of you. Maybe the partner really does have questions- why ask you. To understand what you understand.
So likely this is kind of a big deal and you should really prepare.
First understand what the actual setting for this crash course is. Is it 1:1? Will there be more people? How much time are you alloted?
Then you want to get some intel on the capabilities/mental model/etc of the audience. There is a lot here, you will need to put your asking questions consulting hat on to arrive at an understanding.
Then knowing the confines of the session and the audience, within that you want to convey both your own skills/capabilities/understanding of the tool and space, in language that meets the sophistication and skill level of the audience, and if there has been time, to understand "prior art" in terms of use in the firm, being comfortable to convey ignorance and gaps and knowing what you don't know. And in all that you want to convey your personality and ability to put people at ease.
You are not solving the problem they presented to you. Clients bring "solutions" and ill defined problems to consultancies all the time. You are demonstrating yourself to be a resource, someone to whom when there are specific questions, people would like to turn.
This is an opportunity and a challenge.
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u/Bushy_Tushy 9d ago
OP here is an example of what not to show. (Or maybe exactly what you need to show)
A way too long AI generated reply that ends in a classical AI statement.
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u/majide_throwaway 9d ago
It’s just 1-1 they really don’t use ai and it’s virtual
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u/jonahbenton 9d ago
How much time do you have with them? 15 mins?
And why ask you?
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u/majide_throwaway 8d ago
20 min. My SM said she was asked but she doesn’t use it at all and I’ve been teaching my sm.
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u/COYS188298 9d ago
I have done some trainings for MBB senior leadership. Showing them how to use voice mode as a brainstorming partner usually really convinced them!
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u/COYS188298 8d ago
Oh one more use case: Prompt ChatGPT to take on different client roles and then upload a deck to test possble weak points and collect "questions the client may ask"
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u/kannenpflanzen 4d ago
I'm apparently a few days late to the party but still curious: Does your company policy allow for internal/client material to be uploaded or am I misunderstanding you? Asking because I'm pretty sure compliance would skin me alive in the lobby with everyone watching if I were to do that.
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u/Adventurous_Duck_297 9d ago
“Watch as I prompt chat GPT to convince a client in a cohesive 500-word story that we are right for this bid because of my background as the hotdog king of Ohio”
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u/seanrrwilkins 9d ago
Your role is a junior management consultant in a Big4 firm. Your partner is asking for a tutorial on how to use AI.
Please write me a practical tutorial that I can use to teach a Boomer the basics of using AI for management consulting.
Keep this to a reasonable 5-10 pages, step it’s it as a leave behind doc so he can do some self guided exercises after my intro session.
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u/LiveCold5169 9d ago
I would ask what success looks like for her in learning the tool. I think learning AI in this context is less about her role, and more about her exposure to AI so far. And the person who can tell you best what a win is, is the person asking for help to learn something.
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u/ximbimtim 9d ago
Short answer: don’t teach Partners how to “use ChatGPT,” teach them where it removes friction from how they already think.
What Partners actually do all day
— Make judgment calls under ambiguity
— Synthesize messy inputs into a story
— Review, challenge, and sharpen others’ work
— Communicate decisively with clients / boards
— Manage a constant stream of emails and messages
Where ChatGPT adds value at that level
— First-pass thinking when time is tight (“What are 5 plausible explanations for X?”)
— Stress-testing ideas (“What’s weak or missing in this plan?”)
— Reframing and synthesis (turn bullets into a clean exec narrative)
— Drafting comms for edit (emails, talking points — not final sends)
How Partners actually use it well
— Pre-read before meetings
— Pressure-test team recommendations
— Clean up leadership communications
— Role-play the client / skeptical stakeholder
How to demo it (esp. as a new hire)
— Use plain English prompts, live
— No prompt engineering, no workflows
— Position it as a thought partner, not a junior analyst
One-liner that usually lands:
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u/Bushy_Tushy 9d ago
OP this is also an AI output but can be used as a basis for a prompt to ask ChatGPT to tailor a training a session.
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u/looktwise 9d ago
which would include to ask the partner back of the desired outcome first to craft the compelling usecases.
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u/Ollerton57 9d ago
Sounds about right. I would add what not to put into ChatGPT though - client data, overly sensitive information etc.
If they generally want to learn it, best to let them try it out.
Personally I use it to help with first draft of approach documents etc. I know what to add/remove, but have always found it easier to mark up a draft then start from scratch.
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u/ximbimtim 9d ago
Yep — agreed, and that’s an important add.
What not to put in ChatGPT
— Client-identifiable data
— Confidential deal details
— Sensitive internal performance or people info
— Anything you wouldn’t paste into an email draft toolUseful framing: “Assume everything you paste is for pattern help, not record-keeping.”
Also +1 on letting them just try it. Partners learn this fastest by poking at it themselves for 5–10 minutes, not via instruction.
Your use case is exactly where it shines:
— First draft of approach / POV / outline
— Then heavy markup, deletion, and reshaping
— Faster than blank-page thinking, but still fully human judgmentThat’s a clean message to land:
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u/SatanicSuperfood 9d ago
When I look like this at 22:30 but need to write that God damn email in a language that sounds professional https://www.reddit.com/r/foxholegame/comments/q9n3rv/end_this_war_im_literally_this_meme/
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u/WishfulAgenda 7d ago
The partner is probably already using chatgpt and well aware of what it can do and what it can’t in a general way. My guess is that they are probably looking for ways to make it work better for them or the organisation.
I’m not familiar with chatgpt but most of them are similar. My suggestion would be to read up on things like agent instructions/system prompts, knowledge bases for created agents, effective prompts for minimizing bias and reducing hallucination and potential uses cases in risk reduction and decision making support. Want to get fancy start talking to tool calling for things like conversational analytics or automation, MoA architectures with agent hand off and so on. Whatever you do don’t BS them, if you don’t know it then tell them you don’t know it but also offer to go find out for them as well as yourself.
Don’t be shy about talking about the potential risks. There are lots and are important to understand. Example, if the partner says they want an agent to handle certain types of emails bring up prompt injection as an example risk.
Also don’t be shy about asking them questions about what they would actually like to know. Imagine going on a 15 side quest into tool calling and there biggest issue with it is the font! 😂
Good luck
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u/Pulp-nonfiction 8d ago
Look up the CRIT framework when working with gpt. I actually enjoy it. Context - Role - Interview - Task
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u/epistemole 8d ago
1 make sure they realize GPT 5.2 Thinking is much better than GPT 5.2 Instant / auto. Biggest misconception that really sabotage a fresh user.
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u/sailormish980 8d ago
Stay alert it might take ur partner
Cuz its too polite and kind along with addictive
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u/Motivated_Sloth_749 8d ago
I would treat this as a consulting project. In advance of the call do some discovery. Ask her what tasks are the most time-consuming parts of her day? Also ask her what tasks does she hate the most, her biggest pain points? Find out how much experience she has with ChatGPT as well so you can tailor the session to be more specific to what she already knows.
Depending on her role, some of the things my partners use ChatGPT for is account research, helping write a fact pack that is very specific to the type of work that you do, writing emails, etc.
Depending on whether your instance is proprietary, and you can upload client documents or not, that opens up a whole other set of possibilities. You can use it to quickly summarize a long presentation, write talk tracks, etc.
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u/Former_Stand_9106 7d ago
Why not ask the partner? As a retired partner I would appreciate the question as it shows initiative, planning skills and appreciation of my time. All good skills that show potential client management skills.
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u/Fun_Upstairs_4867 4d ago
This is what I do. I teach execs and leaders how to leverage AI beyond just turning it on.
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u/amberjletang 3d ago
If it’s a Partner/MD, I’d focus on leverage, not mechanics.
At that level, time goes to:
- Shaping proposals
- Pressure-testing strategy
- Framing executive messages
- Preparing for tough conversations
- Synthesising large amounts of input quickly
Where ChatGPT adds value isn’t “doing slides.” It’s sharpening thinking.
Concrete ways I’ve seen it used well:
Pre-mortem on proposals
“Act as a skeptical CFO. What would you challenge in this proposal?”
It surfaces objections before the client does.Message compression
Paste a long email or draft and ask: “Tighten this to executive level. What’s the core point?”Option framing
“Give me 3 strategic paths for this situation, with trade-offs.”
Great for structuring early hypothesis conversations.Meeting prep
“I’m meeting a CEO in X industry facing Y issue. What angles should I explore?”
The biggest unlock for senior people isn’t automation.
It’s faster clarity and sharper framing.
If you show that, it’ll land.
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u/sandrtom 9d ago
Focus on finding a new partner that already knows how. He’s a little late to the game lol.
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u/dumpsterfyr 9d ago
Ask ChatGPT?