When it comes to work, whether that's your 9-5, life as a business owner or even just as a full-time student, things can easily get on top of you. But, as AI has improved, it has opened the doors to a whole variety of productivity hacks.
For a long time, I wasn’t using AI to its full potential for work, only occasionally asking ChatGPT what a term meant, or to explain a complicated block of text. However, there are actually many ways to save hours in your work day with AI.
The 9 prompts to boost your productivity at work
1. The grammar checker
Prompt: Analyze this document for grammatical errors. I am writing in American English and want the text to feel [insert style of tone]. Suggest potential changes that would improve it
You can look through a long document hundreds of times and still miss mistakes. By dropping the text into a chatbot and asking for it to scan for errors or changes, you can easily catch all of them in one go.
I also like to ask it if certain phrases have been repeated too often.
2. Summarize this document
Prompt: Summarize this [insert document or link]. In the summary, include a 250 word brief explanation, followed by a deeper analysis looking at relevant information from a web search.
It can be easy to pour hours into reading through long documents, trying to simply understand what they are actually talking about. By getting a chatbot to read through and summarize it, you can quickly find out all of the key information, and even have it explained in more simple terms.
3. Trend analysis
Prompt: Analyze the current trend of [insert topic]. Include research with links, as well as forecasts for the future and important factors to consider
Trend analysis is an important part of a lot of people’s jobs. But it can also be incredibly time consuming. AI is a great assistant on these kind of tasks, doing what could be a job of a few hours in just minutes.
4. Troubleshooting
Prompt: I am having a problem at work. [Insert problem]. Help me troubleshoot it and come up with suggestions to fix it
One of ChatGPT’s most useful functions at work is simply helping troubleshoot a problem. That could be trying to work out how to make a particular Excel formula, a dispute you’re having with a colleague or even trying to understand a complicated subject.
5. The email corrector
Prompt: I need to write an email to my team. I’m struggling to get the wording correct, can you help me edit it to make it sound more professional?
We’ve all been stuck on a particularly hard email to word. If you need a hand, ask ChatGPT to help. It is especially useful with its recent GPT-5.1 update at getting the tone nailed down.
6. Fix my proposal
Prompt: Analyze this proposal and point out any assumptions, weak spots or missing data.
Business proposals can sometimes feel like a shot in the dark. If you’ve been working on them for a while, it can be easy to miss the weak spots in it, or any concerns that someone might have looking at them.
Before unveiling them officially, see what a chatbot thinks. Sometimes, this kind of prompt can pick out factors or concerns that you wouldn’t have even considered.
7. Document analysis
Prompt: Analyze past performance based on these documents. Help me plan for the rest of the year, including suggestions for future projects based on what has been successful in the past
If you have huge documents that analyse what has happened over the year, including trends, projects and more, trying to actually make sense of them can be a bit of a nightmare.
This kind of prompt is useful for making sense of this information, learning from the year that has passed, and how that can influence the next year of projects that you work on.
8. Job interview role play
Prompt: I’m applying for a job as [insert role]. Act as a hiring manager and ask me realistic questions. Give notes on my performance and things I should know at the end.
Not all prompts have to be for those in full time employment, chatbots can also be useful for those looking to get into the job market.
If you’re currently in the process of doing a lot of job interviews, try practicing with ChatGPT to see how you’re doing.
You can do this either via back-and-forth prompts, or in a voice conversation. This feature is now available in most chatbots.
9. Emails simplified [requires use of an email connection]
Prompt: Turn this long email thread into a concise summary with next steps and who is responsible for each item
These days, a lot of AI chatbots offer the ability to connect your email account. By doing this, you can allow ChatGPT or one of its competitors to search through your emails, tracking down certain information or, through the use of an AI agent like Perplexity Comet or ChatGPT Atlas, even sending emails.
Try setting up this access and then using the above prompt to summarize one of those incredibly long email threads into a clear summary.
Of course, if you’re doing this at work, make sure you can connect your work email to ChatGPT before doing it.
Follow Tom's Guide on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our up-to-date news, analysis, and reviews in your feeds.
More from Tom's Guide
- Android Auto just got a massive free upgrade with Gemini — here's all the new features
- Gemini 3 is here — 9 prompts to use that make the most of its new features
- I tried 7 Nano Banana Pro trends — and Gemini 3’s upgrades are mind-blowing
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
