Brain overload is on the rise, and we are trying to figure out how to expand our capacity! Our minds can only absorb so much, and we struggle to retain all the information we encounter. Always context switching, and our spidey senses running at the highest frequency, [regardless of the digital era] is exhausting.

If you read our article on how AI reflects who we are, you might have paused to realize how true or the reaction was the opposite. Regardless, we now ask many questions to clarify the information flooding social channels and the web.

content creator dilemma

The channels are endless for content creators when emerging tech reveals another shiny tool to generate likes, hits, and reposts. What these tools are not great at detecting is how original or real the narrative or the story is.

Let’s take a look back at the decade when reality TV hit the networks, with shows like The Bachelor and Survivor grabbing attention. These shows created a false sense of portrayal because audiences questioned whether the people were ‘real’ or amateur actors were given a script to follow. But there was no mainstream term like ‘Reality TV’ slop, like there is ‘workslop’ showing up in the digital landscape. 

Considering this, in the AI era, why is it okay to label work ‘slop’? Perhaps, unlike reality TV, where the unnatural was obvious and contained, AI-generated slop is harder to spot until it doesn’t match the person’s identity. Forbes describes it, ‘Workslop is AI-generated content that masquerades as finished work but fails to meaningfully advance any actual task‘. This is the added cost of AI use, as there needs to be another level of human scrutiny over content creation, idea generation, and executive information flow. Thought leaders in the space are calling out workslop, and it is amplified on social media. The reality of it all comes down to reputation, trust, and keeping the human in the loop with machines.

adopting new tech

We are champions of new tech, systems, and tools that help us to work faster and smarter. But there’s a catch: the workforce must know what’s under the hood to use it effectively. Regardless of the size of the entity, when companies and small businesses invest in capabilities or software, they need to prepare their people. For the most part, companies purchase software licenses, send an email announcement, and leave the workforce to determine the path forward. This results not only in underutilization but also in not used as intended to operate. 

With tech, human oversight is critical to ensure compliance and governance are at the forefront, enabling safe adoption of new platforms and systems. When we operate outside these guardrails or spread misinformation, it results in costly errors. Behind the walls of corporate America, this is often hidden because executives, already short on time, must scan through noise.

detection

Here’s how executive assistants and knowledge workers can start sharpening their spidey senses. Get familiar with how large language models reason and how they are trained. It is incredible how quickly you can pick up on a false narrative while scanning content, either associating it with the author’s originality or filing it under ‘G’. 

Adopt a system that will bring the workforce along:

• Create two repositories, what good looks like, and not, so you have clear examples to reference if the need arises.
• Explore AI tools like Speechify to understand how AI is transforming text-to-speech.
• When content is unclear or appears to be workslop, reach out to the author. Ask them to add clarity to the data or idea.
• If there’s no security risk or the content isn’t confidential, drop it into an LLM to scan for AI detection, or copy and paste the text into an AI detector like https://zerogpt.org.
• Model a culture of learning responsible AI use.

Elevating agency is learning new ways of working, and adjusting your mindset. Attuning to typical output from sources and to what is not will give you the edge in any digital environment.  EAs are at the forefront of this because mastering signals and team dynamics is what they excel at. Their spidey senses are a natural part of who they are. If companies tracked the cost of workslop, the savings EAs generate [stopping it before it hits the executive’s desk] would surprise the CFO.

Remember, in responsible AI use, the human is the accountable stakeholder. Layers of detection might go unnoticed in the early stages of AI adoption, but eventually the patterns start to surface. When you are in front of leaders, colleagues, or peers to articulate your story, their spidey senses will activate. Your agency is your superpower so protect it, and your depth of knowledge will be deeper than the lore.

If you need to develop your spidey senses, try the learning sprint framework below this example.