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Aleksandra Przegalinska is an Associate Professor and Vice-President of Kozminski University, responsible for Innovation and AI policy as well as Senior Research Associate at the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program. Aleksandra is the head of the Human-Machine Interaction Research Center at Kozminski University, and the Leader of the AI in Management Program. Until recently, she conducted post-doctoral research at the Center for Collective Intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston. She graduated from The New School for Social Research in New York. She is the co-author of Collaborative Society (The MIT Press), and Strategizing AI in Business and Education (Cambridge University Press) published together with Dariusz Jemielniak and, more recently, Converging Minds – The Creative Potential of Collaborative AI (Routledge) published with Tamilla Triantoro
Connect with her to learn more.
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Here are Five Things We Cover:
1. AI Is the New Internet: Dr. Przegalińska compared AI’s rise to the early days of the internet. Just as the internet became essential across every industry, AI is quickly embedding itself into daily workflows — whether you notice it or not. In five years, using AI will be the default. Not using it will be the exception. Students in all disciplines, not just tech, need to understand it.
2. Creative Industries Are Being Disrupted: Unlike past AI waves focused on data analysis and automation, generative AI is transforming creative fields like advertising, marketing, and design. Aleksandra’s research showed that AI can speed up work but doesn’t always improve quality. In fact, overreliance on AI tends to produce generic results. The human element still matters — a lot.
3. Prompting Is the New Power Skill: Your results with AI tools like ChatGPT are only as strong as your prompt. Aleksandra recommends writing detailed prompts that include your goals, audience, and context. She also warns that the first response is often the best — responses tend to decline in quality the longer the conversation goes. To get better output, start fresh or be intentional about how you guide the model.
4. Use AI as a Critic, Not Just a Generator: One of the most creative uses of AI in Aleksandra’s work came when she and her co-author used ChatGPT as a critic while writing their book. They asked the AI to act as a reviewer who disliked the book — and it provided thoughtful, constructive feedback that made the writing stronger. AI doesn’t have to just write things for you; it can improve what you’ve already written.
5. The Future Belongs to Human-AI Collaboration: To thrive in the AI age, students need more than technical knowledge — they need critical thinking, adaptability, and collaboration skills. That includes working with AI as a teammate, understanding its limitations, and knowing when to trust it — and when not to. Everyone has access to these tools now. The real differentiator is how you use them.
Here are Three Actionable Takeaways From This Episode
- Master the art of prompting: Don’t settle for one-line requests. When using AI tools like ChatGPT, provide clear context, your goal, your tone, and your intended audience. A well-crafted prompt leads to significantly better output — and helps you stand out from others using AI generically.
- Use AI as a creative collaborator, not just a shortcut: Instead of having AI write for you, try using it as a critic or brainstorming partner. Ask it to challenge your ideas, offer counterarguments, or punch up your writing. This leads to better, more original work — and sharpens your own thinking.
- Build fluency across multiple tools: Experiment with more than just ChatGPT. Try tools like Claude for long documents or Gemini for different workflows. Understanding the strengths and weaknesses of various AI models makes you more adaptable — and more valuable — in an AI-powered job market.