AI Literacy – Cycle 4

Situation: Overtime costs have increased substantially even though production volume has barely changed.

What you know:

• Overtime hours are up 24% over the last six months.
• Production volume is up only 3%.
• Headcount is essentially unchanged.
• Absenteeism has increased from 4% to 7%.
• Supervisors report more schedule changes and production interruptions.
• On-time delivery has declined from 94% to 89%.
• Management believes the operation may simply need more employees.
• Leadership wants to understand the problem before approving additional hiring.

Starting Prompt:

You are advising a manufacturing company whose overtime hours have increased 24% even though production volume increased only 3%. Headcount is essentially unchanged, absenteeism increased from 4% to 7%, supervisors report more schedule changes and production interruptions, and on-time delivery declined from 94% to 89%.

Management believes additional hiring may be necessary. Analyze the situation, identify the most likely contributors to the overtime increase, and recommend what management should do next before deciding whether to add employees.

Your job: Run it. Evaluate the response. Decide what you want to challenge, investigate, clarify, or pursue. Tell the AI and continue from there.

Situation: One of the company’s largest customers continues to grow, but operations is questioning whether the account is actually good business.

What you know:

• Annual sales to the customer increased 18%.
• The customer represents approximately 14% of company revenue.
• Their orders are smaller and more frequent than comparable customers.
• They regularly request expedited production.
• They require special packaging.
• They receive an 8% volume discount.
• Sales considers the relationship strategically important.
• Operations believes the account is creating significant disruption.
• Leadership does not want to damage an important customer relationship.

Starting Prompt:

You are advising leadership about one of the company's largest customers. The account represents about 14% of revenue and sales increased 18% this year, but its orders are smaller and more frequent than comparable customers, expedited production is common, special packaging is required, and the customer receives an 8% volume discount. Sales considers the account strategically important while operations believes it is increasingly disruptive.

Evaluate the situation and recommend how leadership should approach the customer relationship without unnecessarily putting the account at risk.

Your job: Run it. Decide which part of the response deserves more attention. You might explore profitability, operations, pricing, negotiation, strategic value, missing information, or something else the response causes you to notice.

Situation: Returns have increased significantly for one product family, but the cause has not been established.

What you know:

• Returns increased from 2% to 5% over six months.
• Most returns involve the same general defect.
• Production suspects variation in incoming material.
• The suspected supplier is the company’s lowest-cost supplier and has excellent delivery performance.
• Changing suppliers would increase material costs.
• A new supplier would require approximately 6-8 weeks to qualify.
• Adding additional incoming inspection would slow production.
• Nobody has established that the supplier is actually causing the defect.
• Leadership wants action because customer complaints are increasing.

Starting Prompt:

You are advising a manufacturer experiencing an increase in customer returns from 2% to 5% for one product family. Most returns involve the same type of defect, and production suspects incoming material variation. The current supplier is the lowest-cost option and has excellent delivery performance. Changing suppliers would increase costs and require 6-8 weeks of qualification, while additional incoming inspection could slow production. The supplier has not yet been confirmed as the cause.

Recommend how the company should respond to the quality problem while balancing urgency, cost, production impact, and the uncertainty about the root cause.

Your job: Run it and evaluate not only the recommendation but the reasoning behind it. If the AI makes an assumption, jumps too quickly to a solution, or surfaces an interesting possibility, use that to determine your next move.

Task: Apply iteration to something you might actually ask an LLM to help you think through or produce at work.

1. Choose a real work situation.
2. Give the AI enough information to take a good first shot. Use RTIO if it helps you organize your request.
3. Run the request and read the response before planning what comes next.
4. Decide what you want to change, question, explore, or pursue.
5. Tell the AI and review where the next response lands.
6. Repeat until you decide the result is useful enough.

Goal: You are not trying to predict the whole conversation. You are using each response to decide what to do next.