AI Productivity for Busy Professionals

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ChatGPT Prompts for Managers and Team Leaders

As a manager or team leader, your time is dominated by communication: emails, one-to-ones, performance feedback, status updates and meetings. ChatGPT can act as a quiet assistant behind the scenes, helping you think, draft and clarify faster.

This guide shares practical prompts you can use to prepare for conversations, summarise discussions, and communicate clearly with your team without adding more hours to your day.

Using ChatGPT as a management assistant

You remain responsible for judgement and decisions. ChatGPT helps by:

  • Turning rough notes into clear messages.
  • Suggesting talking points for difficult conversations.
  • Summarising team updates and risks.
  • Helping you phrase feedback constructively.

Prompt: Prepare for a one-to-one

You are my management coach. I have a one-to-one meeting with a team member.

I will paste:
- My notes about how things are going
- Any concerns or praise I want to share

Please:
1) Suggest 5–7 talking points for the meeting.
2) Propose 3 open questions I can ask to understand their perspective.
3) Highlight any topics I should handle sensitively.

Here are my notes:
[PASTE NOTES]

Prompt: Draft a clear status update

You are my communication assistant. I will paste rough notes about project
progress, risks and next steps.

Please write a status update for <AUDIENCE> that:
- Starts with a 3–4 bullet executive summary
- Clearly separates "Progress", "Risks" and "Next steps"
- Uses UK English and plain language
- Fits on one screen if possible

Here are my notes:
[PASTE NOTES]

Prompt: Give constructive written feedback

You are my feedback-writing assistant. I will paste notes about a team
member's performance.

Please turn them into constructive written feedback that:
- Acknowledges what is going well
- Describes specific behaviours that need to change
- Suggests 2–3 practical next steps
- Uses a supportive, professional tone
- Avoids labels and personal attacks

Here are my notes:
[PASTE NOTES]

FAQs

Should I show my team that I use ChatGPT?

Many managers choose to be open about using AI as a drafting and thinking tool, while making it clear that real decisions and final wording are still reviewed by a human. Transparency can build trust.

How do I avoid sounding artificial?

Always read and lightly edit the output. Over time, ask ChatGPT to “match my style” and feed it examples of your own writing. Your goal is to save time, not to outsource judgement or authenticity.

Is it safe to paste sensitive information?

Be cautious with personal or confidential data. Use tools approved by your organisation, and anonymise details where possible. You can still get value from ChatGPT using high-level descriptions instead of full transcripts.

Next steps

Pick one real management task today—a one-to-one, team email or status update—and try one of these prompts. Compare the time and mental effort with doing everything from scratch.

If you’d like a full, structured system for using AI across email, meetings, documents and planning, explore the AI Productivity for Busy Professionals course.