The AI Task Audit

Find your first, or next, real AI win with a simple tool you can implement right away.

With all the media hype, AI can seem daunting. Here is a simple AI task audit we shared with our clients via our Ellerra Academy newsletter. We are sharing it here on our resource page to help folks that might need a little boost implementing AI.

How to start using AI

Most entrepreneurs and business professionals know they should be using AI more to help them work smarter. However, non-technical founders and executives tend to struggle knowing exactly where to start. With all the great tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, the bottleneck tends to be the lack of a clear, practical entry point.

Ellerra Academy designed this AI Audit to provide that practical entry point for professionals looking to get started with AI. In less than 10 minutes, you will be able to identify specific tasks in your everyday workflow where AI can deliver the highest potential return. You will walk away with a few working prompts that you can use right away. Regardless if you are a founder, sales leader, consultant, or business executive, this framework will help you be more productive with AI.

Actionable Edge: Your Task Audit

If AI feels overwhelming to you, simply start small and practically. Here is an AI audit that can help you find an AI win you can implement this week.

Action 1: Identify the Task (2 min)

The Problem: You know you need to use AI, but you don't know where to start. You're hesitant to hand over your most complex or valuable work to a chatbot.

The Solution: We've cut the noise. Use a simple, two-part framework to identify the highest-ROI opportunities. Think of your work tasks in terms of two catagories: High Manual Power tasks (repetitive, structures work that might be ripe for immediate automation) and High Brain Power tasks (complex, judgement-intensive work where AI could become a strategic thought partner).

If you are not sure which bucket your task falled into, ask yourself:

"Does this task require judgment, creativity, or nuanced decision making?"

Or

"Does the task require time and attention to complete?"

It it's the latter, it's a High Manual Power task. If it demands strategic thinking, it's a High Brain Power task.

Action 2: Create with AI (5 min)

Choose your tool (ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini) and run one prompt for each task. The goal here it to expereimentwith concepts and see how AI may accelerate the task for you. You may be surprised to see how the AI tools can help you.

Use this Ellerra AI Audit template below to help you track your ideas, what you you try, what works, and what to refine. You can download an excel copy of the template here (DOWNLOAD Ellerra AI Audit)

Prompt Helpers [copy -> edit -> paste]

Here are two prompts that can help you do some heavy lifting. Fill in the brackets with your specific context. The more specific your inputs, the better your outputs.

High Manual Power Prompt

Use the prompt below for repetitive, structures tasks where you just need something produced quickly and consistently.

Prompt:

"You are my operations assistant. Help me complete this repetitive task: [task]. Here are the inputs: [paste notes/data]. Output it as: [format].Keep it: [short/medium], tone:[desired tone]. Do not invent facts. Ask me any missing questions first, then produce the final."

Why this works: By setting a clear role ("operations assistant"), specifying the output format, and explicitly instructing your AI tool not to invent facts, you reduce some of the potential hallucinations and get outputs that tend to be more usable.

High Brain Power Prompt

Use the prompt below when you need a strategic sounding board.

Prompt:

"You are my strategic thought partner. I need help deciding: [decision]. Context: [goat + constraints]. Task: challenge my assumptions, surface risks, and recommend the best option with clear reasoning. End with the next 3 actions I should take this week." 

Why this works: Framing your AI tool as a "thought partner" tends to produce more nuances, critical output. Asking it to challenge your assumptions and surface risks can turn the tool into your personal active collaborator instead of the typical use case where people treat it as a passive answering machine.

Pro tip: If you are struggling with prompts, ask your AI tool to act as a prompt specialist. Paste your rough prompt and use "Thinking" mode:

 Prompt:

"Rewrite this prompt using world-class prompting techniques. Make it clearer, more specific, and more likely to produce an excellent result. Only return the improved prompt: [your prompt]." 

Generating good prompts is one of the most underused techniques in AI productivity. The quality of your AI output is almost always a function of the quality of your prompt, and AI can be used to help you qrite better prompts. Think of it as an on-demand prompt coach!

Action 3: Share

Share your audit and what works with your team so they see you taking the lead on AI initiatives. Feel free to comment in on this post with any questions. Building with your internal team, or in public, can accelerate learning for everyone. Your experiment might be exactly what someone else needs to see to take a big leap forward using AI.

The bottom line

Your AI advantage can start with one simple task. The entrepreneurs, innovators, and achievers pulling ahead with AI right now are not necessarily using the most sophisticated tools or the most complex workflows. They are the ones that simply started with something. Thy picked one task, ran one prompt, and iterated from there. Momemtum, like interest on money, compounds!

This audit is meant to be an easy starting point. We hope you will identify a task, run the prompt, and share your results. We know this framework works. Keep in mind the goal here is not to try and automate your entire job in a week. The aim is to help you start building the skill of reaching for AI when it can be most helpful, so start today.

About Ellerra Academy

Ellerra Academy is the educational division of Ellerra that provides content, resources, and community designed to help entrepreneurs, innovators, and achievers grow through personal development. We provide digital resources and high-touch events to make entrepreneurship more accessible, trustworthy, and deeply human, all while helping our members operate effectively in an AI-shaped economy.