If you’ve ever opened ChatGPT, typed in a question, and got back generic waffle, you’re not alone.

At the Chamber’s latest AI Skills workshop — Getting Results with AI: Practical Prompt Engineering — local digital strategist Pat Cunningham showed how to turn that frustration into productivity. The session, part of our ongoing AI Series, focused on the single biggest factor in whether AI helps or hinders you: how you ask it.

Forget the jargon. This is just smart communication.

Prompt engineering sounds technical, but it’s really about giving clear instructions. Pat compared it to briefing a colleague. “If you give them a vague request, you’ll get a vague answer. If you’re clear about context, tone and format, you’ll get something genuinely useful.”

Here are Pat’s 7 ways to improve your prompting:

1. Give AI context

Instead of “Write a sales email for my business,” try: “You’re the marketing manager for a Guernsey architecture studio. Write a warm, jargon-free email inviting clients to an open studio event.” The difference is instant. It sounds like you, not a generic chatbot.

2. Teach it your tone

AI can mimic your style if you show it what that looks like. Keep a short copywriting guide or sample paragraph that captures your style and paste it at the start of any writing task. It’s a one-time setup that saves endless rounds of rewriting later.

3. Let AI do the boring bits

From Excel formulas to cleaning up messy data, AI loves a repetitive task.  Pat demonstrated how a chaotic contact list could be tidied in seconds — names and emails perfectly aligned — and how one simple prompt generated a working Excel formula to calculate the number of working days between two dates, complete with an explanation – the prompt: ‘ Create a formula to calculate the number of working days between two dates’ 
For anyone who’s ever wrestled with nested IFs and COUNTIFs, it was a game-changer.

4. Summarise, don’t improvise

AI is brilliant at condensing information that already exists, but unreliable when it has to invent things. Feed it a policy or report and ask: “Summarise this into five bullet points suitable for a team briefing.” You’ll get something short, clear and accurate — perfect for internal updates or compliance comms.

5. Try Deep Research for long, thoughtful tasks

Pat also demoed Deep Research mode, a feature in advanced AI tools that takes time (up to 15 minutes) to read, analyse and cite sources before producing a full report. He used it to generate a market overview for local design firm, complete with trends and opportunities. It’s perfect for early-stage strategy work, student projects or anyone needing a properly referenced overview without starting from scratch.

6. Use it to cool down your emails

If you’ve ever drafted a heated reply, you’ll love this prompt: “Rewrite this email in a calm, professional tone that keeps the key message.” It softens tone without losing meaning, which means ou sound composed, not cold.

7. Stay on the safe side

Before pasting real data into AI tools, check your company’s AI policy. Use anonymised examples, or approved platforms like Microsoft Copilot within your 365 environment. AI is powerful, but it still needs your judgement.

Not replacing people. Freeing them.

By the end of the session, attendees agreed: AI isn’t about replacing people. It’s about freeing them to think, create and lead. “I’d been dabbling, but now it makes sense,” one participant said. “It’s not the tools. It’s how you talk to them.”

The Chamber’s AI Skills Series continues next month. Keep an eye on the events page to find out what’s next in this practical series.