Professional Development
Article Recommendation: "Want to Use AI as a Career Coach? Use These Prompts."
🏫 Harvard Business Review published an excellent article on using LLMs (GenAI) as a career coach.
🧠 As usual, be careful and watch out for hallucinations and be certain to fact check any information and utilize citations (if given).
🤝 In the end, do your own homework and remember, it’s a companion, not a monolith.
🎒 The added benefit is that you will home in on your own unique skills and make you reflect all the while, creating the basis for the utilization of LLMs, which will put you above those who do not yet use this technology.
✏️ It’s not going away, so you might as well make it work for you, in more ways than one!
This was originally a post on my personal LinkedIn page.
The Real Danger of Misinterpreting AI
Believing AI is sentient leads to false expectations—some may trust AI’s recommendations without skepticism, assuming they are the result of independent reasoning rather than probabilistic predictions. In policy discussions, regulators struggle with defining AI responsibility, misplacing ethical accountability onto models instead of the humans who deploy them. The danger is not AI itself but how we perceive and integrate it into decision-making, security, and governance.
‼️ Don’t Be Like Everyone Else:
🧠 Understand AI’s Limitations – It predicts and mimics, but it does not think. Recognizing this distinction helps avoid misinterpretation.
📖 Stay Informed on AI Ethics and Policy – Governments are trying to regulate AI’s role, but misconceptions could shape flawed laws.
🔨 Use AI as a Tool, Not a Decision-Maker – It can enhance productivity, but critical thinking must always come first.
The future belongs to those who understand AI for what it is—not what sci-fi wants it to be. Whether you’re a student, a professional, or a policymaker, mastering AI’s true capabilities is no longer optional—it’s a necessity.
This was originally posted on LinkedIn on May 30, 2025.
Reading Update: The First Half of 2025
Below are some of the highlights of my readings for the first half of the year. As I’m always on a journey of knowlege of self-improvement, I enjoy delving in to a variety of topics. Society has pinned the individual as becoming an expert in one field, while neglecting the whole person, including the humanities and soft skills!
If you’ve been following my micro.blog (this site), you’ve noticed that the Bookshelves features allow me to post when I’ve completed a read. This is a culmination of those.
Who Knew by Barry Diller: A fresh read completed just yesterday! The biography of a media mogul who ran companies such as ABC, Paramount, Fox, QVC and more.
21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari: A thought-provoking, delving into the challenges of our current era.
On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder: A crucial and vital read on safeguarding democracy.
Facts and Fears: Hard Truths from a Life in Intelligence by James Clapper: Gaining insights from the accomplished intelligence professional who ran the ODNI and other agencies.
America’s New Map by Thomas P.M. Barnett: Exploring geopolitical shifts and their implications discussing free-trade, climate change, and international cooperation.
Beneath a Surface by Brad Sams: A deep dive into the intricacies of introducing and developing the Microsoft Surface, at the time, a new line of product.
Playing to the Edge: American Intelligence in the Age of Terror by Michael Hayden: Understanding the complexities of intelligence operations.
Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams: A compelling narrative about ambition and its consequences at Meta and it’s various properties.
The Sirens' Call: How Attention Became the World’s Most Endangered Resource by Chris Hayes: A timely reflection on our most valuable resource.
The Gutenberg Parenthesis: The Age of Print and Its Lessons for the Age of the Internet by Jeff Jarvis: Connecting historical media shifts to our digital present.
The Big Nine: How the Tech Titans and Their Thinking Machines Could Warp Humanity by Amy Webb: A critical look at the future of AI and its impact; highly focused on the United States vs. China.
From Cold War To Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia by Michael McFaul: Essential reading on modern international relations.
Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone by Satya Nadella: Inspiring leadership and corporate transformation.
The Genesis Machine: Our Quest to Rewrite Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology by Amy Webb and Andrew Hessel: Exploring the frontiers of synthetic biology.
Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment by Jason Schreier: A fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the gaming industry.
Autocracy, Inc. by Anne Applebaum: A crucial examination of the rise of authoritarian regimes.
Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology by Chris Miller: Understanding the geopolitical battle for semiconductors.
I’m currently reading two more titles, and hopefully I’ll find the time to keep it up through the remainder of the year! I will be looking forward to making a second half ‘25 post on what’s next.
Navigating the Future: Why Mastering LLMs is Essential for Today's Students & Workers
After reading this piece on CNBC’s website regarding how students should be using AI (I still prefer the term LLMs for purposes of nobody can identify what AI is and isn’t), it’s making me consider what today’s youth is learning with respect to preferential employment skills moving forward.
First consider the interviewer. Jesen Huang’s goal is to sell as many customers on GPU compute and resources as humanly possible given his field so we must take that with a grain of salt. Secondly, the tools of LLMs are a must have in today’s educational and workforce. If you aren’t utilizing prompting to the fullest extent; you are already falling behind. Take the time to find an online course through EdX or Coursera, for example, to home in these skills.
Huang stated:
Learning how to interact with AI is not unlike being someone who’s really good at asking questions,” he added. “Prompting AI is very similar. You can’t just randomly ask a bunch of questions. Asking AI to be an assistant to you requires some expertise and artistry of how to prompt it.
Like all tools, they must not only be learned but practically used. Using a tool for the sake of it, creates more problems and diminishing results will follow.
We also must question whether the idea of learning how to code is vital for today’s computer science programs. I still argue yes! If we blindly follow output from a chatbot, we lack the ability to understand what the code means, if it works, or how useful it is to the original prompt. “Is this what the client actually asked for?” or “How can we implement this?” are two major questions that will never go away. Just like Wikipedia was and is a tool as a basis for research and learning, chatbots, and LLM products should also provide this starting point. As always, check the source material as like Wikipedia, bias and humans still intervene in the research and results that an LLM product provides.
The part that Huang really gets correct is as follows:
Perfecting AI prompts — and asking better questions in general — is a skill that will remain relevant for years to come, so students should take the time to develop it, no matter what career field they see themselves in.
A large amount of Academica is yet to be versed on Large Language Models as a whole and prompting is still new to those set in their ways. Aiding in research is paramount to have a companion in the room that makes learning easier and the consumption of knowledge more streamlined.
We have a long way to go as a society between those who are skeptical of LLMs at all costs and those who talk to it and treat it as it’s a human being with real thoughts and valid feelings. The battle between skeptics vs. accelerationists is not one we should be having; but a moderating position to accept them as tools that we all must learn to be successful in any career or academic endeavor; no matter what areas of study we choose to pursue.
Primary Source Material is Crucial for Facts & Research
Back in college we all had access to those often bulky, hard to use research databases, that sometimes worked, but often steered us in the wrong direction. We had to teach ourselves Boolean operators to properly navigate them. There was a reason other than torture for utilizing those; to help us all find primary source materials to write our research papers.
As is often the case, that's about the only time we used academia, raw data and studies to conduct our analysis on any given topic. Unfortunately, many of us negated those skills in our everyday lives. We only read tweets and not the accompanying story bylines and don't question it. We turn on cable news for answers. As soon as we rely on others to conduct the analysis, we lose control of what is fact and what is not.
For the purposes of this post, I'll be looking at the continued importance of primary source for conducting our own research for whatever we desire. I'll point out what to search for, how to do so, and how to read misleading studies and research.
Stated before, this should be a refresher from college or even high school, yet we forget such things in the era of social media and cable news. Bias is at a premium, and this should be your first factor when looking for a source to research a claim.
We will use the example of historical context of the following: A database may contain a personal letter from John F. Kennedy or Richard Nixon urging to sway the constituent their way to vote. While this is a primary source and is unique and certainly has its place in history, it is quite biased and should not be used to factcheck, unless the piece is a part of a larger historical research project, per say.
Let's take the example of a major economic number; the monthly non-farm payroll report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is the primary source for all data relating to U.S. employment, unemployment, wages, including a break down where the jobs were gained, lost, and why. The method for collection is survey. Since COVID-19, the BLS has also factored in the ways in which the survey takers communicate their situation.
The response rate for the household survey was 75 percent in September 2021. While the rate was lower than the average before the pandemic of 83 percent for the 12 months ending in February 2020, it was considerably higher than the low of 65 percent in June 2020.
Bureau of Labor Statistics
We must keep in mind as the response rate returns more to normal levels, that there still may be some slack in respondents, creating a larger margin of error (MOE) in responses. As sample sizes decrease, the chance for skew increases. Though this is a primary source, keep in mind any data deterioration that may arise as the survey was collected, in this case for the month of October 2021.
Continuing on the document, the BLS talks about the misclassification issue. Surveys are meant as a point-in-time Continuing through the document, the BLS talks about the misclassification issue. Surveys are meant as a point-in-time and simply not capable of handling entire population sizes. Technically, if an employee is "on leave" due to COVID, they are not considered unemployed, thus, a misclassification has taken place.
If the misclassified workers who were recorded as employed but not at work for the entire survey reference week had been classified as “unemployed on temporary layoff,” the unemployment rate would have been higher than reported.
Bureau of Labor Statistics
Given that COVID-19 was a once-in-a-generation situation, statistical measures can be improved upon moving forward if any other possible disruptive events occur. Like all Data Scientists, hypothesis must be carefully created, methodologies are more important on a national level such as the BLS, and the data requires further refinement and consultation as to what "voluntary leave" or "furloughed" means if these become larger data points in surveys going forward.
An economic number may not be what it seems on a headline or in an article posted in CNBC, Bloomberg, NYT, or Fox Business, for example. Their job is to get clicks and engagement (positive and negative). It's how these sites and companies boost ad revenue in a world where Facebook and Google dominate the online ad market. It's your job to question where these claims came from, to consider what the bias may be, and to retrace the steps to obtain a deeper understanding of what the numbers are "really" telling.
Though it may seem a bit absurd, we all must be capable of basic data science when it comes to understanding the headline. False claims and skewed articles run ramped in the age of social media. Older publications have unfortunately fallen into the same category as they race for clicks and their own share of the ad market. Leave your own biases aside when considering what to think after reading questionable content. Do your homework, as it were. The true comprehension of the story will come through and you can inform others why these pieces may have gotten the story wrong.
One Year at a Non-Profit
Volunteering has always been a part of my personal ethos. I'm reminded of my time as an AmeriCorps VISTA at Engaging Creative Minds, which I spent a year from 2017 until 2018. I wrote this post some years ago, but it is an experience that I hope that all younger folks will take advantage of.
In creating my plans long ago, the thought never came into my mind about actively working for an educational non-profit for a year through the AmeriCorps VISTA program. One year has passed and I have fulfilled my experience and dedication to this organization. The background I possess has ramifications far beyond non-profits, but also learned quite a bit about this different type of structure along the way.
My mind works as a project manager; processing ways to try new methods and procedures quicker, failing faster, yet creating a bread trail that paves the way for others not to make the same mistakes. Learning and failing is okay, if it’s never been tried. With a Six Sigma eye, every moment of productivity moves through my brain on a filter. Planning two or three steps out to measure potential outcomes is paramount in any organizational success. Non-profits are no different.
Agile Atmosphere. Often many are working on long-term projects, operations, finance, and outreach. Non-profits have quick turnover, yet a dedicated base of volunteers, funding mechanisms, and grants. Financial and non-financial players demand the organization be open, especially to those most inclined to visualize success. Documentation is a key salient point for enduring successes. Moving quickly through what does not work allows for successful pivoting through multiple strategies.
Experimentation. Reaching towards the next internal goal is vital to expanding organizational reach to the community and to funders. How to get there takes more creativity than personnel may be used to. Not being afraid to try and fail still plagues the mindset in for-profit or government organizations. With non-profits, this thinking must be a way of life; as if organizational survival depends on it, because it does.
Scrum. In smaller organizations, there may be one or two figure heads in a department, and that is all. Departments often depend on one another to see through a strategy to its full implementation. Creating strategies and cross-functional teams, or pairing individuals, to move through plans is the only way to ensure cohesiveness. After the formulation and implementation phases, all must be brought in to be briefed on what’s next. This eliminates duplication of tasks, efforts, and allows for more frequent but quicker meetings regarding potential roadblocks.
This unique experience allowed important insights into how the multibillion-dollar non-profit sector works. The larger takeaway is that all organizational behavior only slightly differs between government agencies and the for-profit sectors. The missions and goals are the same, however only the stakeholders differ. We all serve a vast yet similar set of stakeholders throughout our lives.
Why I'm Taking a Year to Volunteer
Life experiences make up the structure of a person. Choosing to give time and effort takes dedication and sweat equity. Some may choose to give donations over their time. This all depends on what each individual is willing to commit and how dedicated they are to engulfing themselves into the effort.
Estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that only 24.9% of Americans are engaged in volunteering within their communities, a slow downward trajectory from only five years ago. Statistics aside, volunteering is about not showing that an individual cares, but rather getting personally involved with issues that are deeply ingrained to what is believed to be contributing to societal problems.
As a person who is working on his masters in intelligence management, becoming a public servant is only a small part of what is entailed. Keeping the United States secure from foreign and domestic threats is vital to my career goals, however, this cannot be taken for granted. There are American values which need to be protected, including the right of children to learn and become the country's future.
AmeriCorps VISTA offers a unique set of organizational goals to help serve the nation and improve the standing of poverty within it. Education is power. Each child must be given an opportunity to learn, explore their own potentials, and contribute to their own way to the nation. Exploring avenues for children in poverty and low-income households to explore the sciences will the strengthen resolve of educators, parents, and communities.
The goal of academia will still continue, albeit at a slightly slower pace. It is important to concentrate on the goals of the organization that is the assignment from 2017 to 2018. The courses will always be there, other opportunities may not be. Learning and assisting at all levels of society is pivotal to understanding what exactly the mission and objectives of the intelligence community means to the average person. It reminds us who is being protected and given a chance to thrive.
Putting names and faces to children who need assistance and opportunity will always be a standpoint to take away upon entering the intelligence and national security apparatus. Allowing safe environments free from threats is vital to making the United States as strong as it can be.
Agile Methods Aren't Just for Startups
The very definition of agile is the ability to move quickly, make changes, and adapt as needed to changing circumstances. Agile is a frequented term in the development of software and startups, but these principles can also be used to improve the quality and outcomes of life. More importantly, it is the incremental improvement of processes and procedures to ensure these desired goals.
Like any good product or business plan, its best to start out with goals. These can be career, life, financial, etc. Don’t be too broad when brainstorming. Making concise steps in a to-do list, creating a mind map or decision tree are all excellent methods in putting out there what it is you want to accomplish.
The best-seller, Startup Weekend, talks about how to take a concept of a product and bring it to fruition. Iteration, adaptability, and replicability are all important when it comes to scale. A major principle of agile states that its best to fail quickly, pick up the pieces, and move on to change tactics, however, don’t take too much time as the world moves quickly and any strategy could be undermined by competition.
In one’s life goals, competition can be seen as others who want the same career, time, technological changes, or economic fundamentals. While each situation is different, the ability to adapt is paramount in making this strategy work. Do not be afraid to fail, be open minded, and most important; brainstorm ideas & changes through networking.
Iterating on changes can be achieved by crowdsourcing, beta testing, and focus groups. While this is true for business or concepts, it can still be done on an individual level. Using social networks like Linkedin, or Workplace for Facebook are great methods for putting ideas out there for subjection, and receiving quick feedback to see if the right route is being taken. If not, then pivot.
Fine tuning any strategy to achieve career or personal goals is by no means a simple task. It must take a lot of strategizing and stretching outside of comfort zones to know what will work. Achievable tasks, the ability to fail quickly, and an open mind are the most important considerations when using agile principles in everyday life.
Ditching Instagram: Focusing on Meaningful Connections
Yes! You heard it here first. Like all of you, I was excited for Instagram when it first hit the scene back in late 2010 and still had my original account from that time. Meta (formerly Facebook) famously purchased the business for $1 billion and successfully integrated it into its ad network and social graph, but I'm not here to relive or debate history -- we can save the positives and negatives for another post.
This is not to bash the platform, nor criticize those who use it to build their business, brands and outreach. I do not have those needs. Mine was a personal account that I spent way too much time "doom scrolling", searching for vanity likes, outreach, and engagement. Personal accounts should not be used for this purpose as it adds no value, and frankly, grows into one big time constraint.
If you are a former reader of mine, you'll notice one big advantage thus far -- I'm posting a blog. Not a LinkedIn snippet or repost from BlueSky but writing an actual post which I have not done in quite some time. My annual domain registration and WordPress bills are coming due, and I want to take the time this year to build out my writing and reach through conversations, not vanity contests.
We must also consider mental health. In recent decades, one's well-being in this field is taking more seriously than it ever has been, and to different folks, that means different outcomes. For me, the question is -- what could I best be spending my time on for my skill set, career, and helping others? These values are important to me, and Instagram dopamine hits were not contributing meaningfully to those values.
So, what will I fill my days doing? I plan on working on evolving my personal networking techniques, read more (whether its audiobooks, eBooks or good old-fashioned tree-killers); and working on posting when and where it matters. I plan on making meaningful contributions to other publications to extend my reach and expertise.
The advances in AI of the past two-years have really made me reflect on what platforms and mediums are meaningful and whether they help or harm the cause. Again, I should write many more posts on that topic, and likely will. I need to learn more and talk less. Pushing out photos and media that feels "forced" is not a strategy worth pursuing.
If you would like to follow in these footsteps, I've included a link on how to delete your Instagram account. Be careful, re-logging in during the 30-day window will reset the timer and you'll have to start the countdown over again. Your mileage on taking this action can and should vary. I'm looking forward to using my new-found time to create longer, researched, in-depth posts and being confident enough in what I conclude to post on the platforms I still utilize.