Will the widespread adoption of prompt engineering commoditize project management skills, or can it help PMs differentiate themselves and command higher value?
Director, Learning Design & Development| PMIAsheville, NC, United States
Hi PMI Community! I’m Sarah Philbrick, and I work as a Product Manager at PMI with a focus on our learning offerings. As we go on this skill-building journey together, I’m excited to engage in meaningful conversations, explore trending topics, and learn from each other.
Reflecting on one such topic, GenAI and prompt engineering, I am interested to hear your perspective on commoditization vs. differentiation.
Will the widespread adoption of prompt engineering commoditize project management skills, or can it help PMs differentiate themselves and command higher value?
Robert AbeytaSenior Director of Supply Chain| Botanix PharmaceuticalsGilbert, AZ, United States
This will be sort of like having a patent.
While you have your patent, you exploit the market (in a good way) to generate the revenue that you invested to obtain your patent. Then when you patent expires, you are commoditized just like everyone else.
GenAI will be a novelty at first, so early adopters will have their "patent period" where they know more than the rest of the PM's out there. Then, as the GenAI knowledge base becomes more widespread and taught/used more commonly over time, the early adopters lose their "patent" knowledge advantage and become commoditized, just like all other PM's. But, by then these early adopters will have probably moved onto the next thing anyway. Saving Changes...
Ah, the age-old question of whether technology will make us obsolete or turn us into superheroes. Let me tell you, as a project management expert, the rise of prompt engineering is not going to turn us into mere commodities. Quite the opposite, my friend. It's like giving us a secret weapon, a superpower, if you will, to elevate our game and stand out in the crowd.
Imagine this: you're a project manager, and you've got this nifty tool called generative AI at your disposal. It's like having a sidekick who never sleeps, never complains, and always has your back. With prompt engineering, you can craft precise instructions to get the AI to do exactly what you need. Need a first draft of a cost-benefit analysis? Done. Want to detect anomalies in your project data? Easy peasy. Looking to identify scope change recommendations? Consider it handled.
Here's the kicker: while everyone else is fumbling around with generic AI outputs, you, my savvy project manager, are fine-tuning your prompts to get the most accurate and helpful responses. You're not just using AI; you're mastering it. This isn't about replacing your skills; it's about amplifying them. Your strong communication, creativity, critical thinking, and adaptability are the perfect ingredients for effective prompt engineering. You're not just a project manager; you're a project management wizard.
So, will prompt engineering commoditize project management skills? Absolutely not. It will help PMs like you differentiate yourselves and command higher value. You'll be the one who can leverage AI to deliver better outcomes, faster and more efficiently. You'll be the one who can navigate the complexities of modern projects with ease, thanks to your AI-enhanced abilities.
In summary, prompt engineering is not a threat to project management; it's an opportunity. It's a chance to become more efficient, more effective, and more valuable. So embrace your new superpowers, and show the world what a project manager with AI can really do.
I think it will improve the PM skills because the feedback from other projects will enrich the knowledge. The point here is to make the proper adaptations to the new way of working on the projects, to improve in all the areas where the project manager has to work. Saving Changes...
For the immediate future, AI will serve as a valuable assistant to, but not replace, the PM.
Agree. Adoption of prompt engineering will augment the PM role by assisting with many of the basic/general tasks that can be commoditized. It will actually free up PMs to focus on activities such as strategy, decision making, risk management, team and stakeholder management, enabling PMs to command higher value. Saving Changes...
Prompt engineering is the art as well as science of designing inputs to elicit desired outputs from Gen-AI models. These models, such as Open-AI's GPT or other advanced large language models (LLMs), rely on well-structured prompts to produce accurate, relevant, and contextual results. A well-crafted prompt bridges the gap between the user's intention and the model's interpretation, enhancing both the efficiency and accuracy of AI-generated content. Saving Changes...
Prompt engineering is the art as well as science of designing inputs to elicit desired outputs from Gen-AI models. These models, such as Open-AI's GPT or other advanced large language models (LLMs), rely on well-structured prompts to produce accurate, relevant, and contextual results. A well-crafted prompt bridges the gap between the user's intention and the model's interpretation, enhancing both the efficiency and accuracy of AI-generated content. Saving Changes...
Harish RanganathaPgMP coach and Program Manager Consultant| ACEPROBangalore, Kar., India
May 24, 2024 5:41 AM
Replying to Sergio Luis Conte
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With the new generation of generative AI portfolio/program/project manager and business analyst role "are dead" at least in the way they were originally defined. I think a good source to understand that are the two courses on generative AI delivered for free by the PMI, mainly if you see the 3 layer model.
Yes. Very much. I forsee the AI chat as a chatting with PMO or a PM Guru. Hence the management part of responsibility still with Project manager. Saving Changes...
Nirav PatelManagement| TeamuprightDahisar, Mumbai, India
As understanding the context of the current project or product development status is super critical for any decision making, project manager will continue to play critical role. However Prompt will assist PM in creating required project assert. Saving Changes...
Eric OrtegaOmnitech, Inc.Sioux Falls, Sd, United States
No, but it will change the nature of project management. An AI cannot have the same level of tribal knowledge as a human in a human working environment. We forget that AIs exist, to a large extent, in vacuums. Nuance, which is something LLM's already have issues with, is where the art of project management exists. Remember, there's no such thing as project management. There IS management of people working on projects. That connection and interaction won't be synthetically duplicated until machines are taught how to feel. Saving Changes...
With the new generation of generative AI portfolio/program/project manager and business analyst role "are dead" at least in the way they were originally defined. I think a good source to understand that are the two courses on generative AI delivered for free by the PMI, mainly if you see the 3 layer model.
Not completely dead as still need to provide an expert prompt specific to suffice the project needs or for better product orientation, that's my perspective for now. thanks Saving Changes...
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