What AI (ChatGPT) means for the future of training

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been the subject of speculation in science fiction for decades, with many predicting that it will revolutionise our personal and professional lives. From healthcare to business and finance, implementation of AI is rapidly transforming industry sectors. In this CPD article, we will look at what ChatGPT is and what it means for the future of training.

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT was created by Open AI, an Artificial Intelligence research and deployment organisation that conducts research into and implements machine learning. In 2020, Open AI announced ChatGPT, a language model trained on large datasets. Put simply, ChatGPT is a computer program that uses algorithms and huge amounts of data to generate text that sounds like a human. It allows users to interact with it using natural language.

Even at the time of writing, further developments are being made on a daily basis. The announcement of ChatGPT-4, adding imagery, is further allowing new ideas to flourish using the company’s API. This allows external companies to connect with ChatGPT to further their own projects.

What can ChatGPT do?

While it has a vast dataset at its disposal, asking ChatGPT a question through its Chatbot is not like asking Google a question. Chat GPT-3 is not connected to the internet. All the knowledge data input to ChatGPT currently goes as far as 2021. The data after that does not yet exist in the system. However, a major advantage on the side of Chat GPT is that it understands follow up questions.

If you start a new question – called chat – in ChatGPT and do not get the exact answer you are looking for, you can continue in the same chat with a follow up. ChatGPT knows that this is still within the realms of the same conversation and is related to what was asked before, meaning that you can get more precise answers for your questions with each additional step.

With ChatGPT’s influence growing daily, what can it actually do? We have outlined some benefits and uses below:

1. Generates human like text to prompts or questions. It uses phrases humans would most likely use in these situations.
2. Provides factual answers about anything in its knowledge base.
3. Condenses long pieces of information into smaller condensed pieces of text without losing the original meaning.
4. Translates from one language to another.
5. Can be used as a chat bot, responding to user queries, helping to find information or complete tasks.
6. It can assist with generating creative text as well as propagating content creation ideas.
7. Analyses the sentiment of a written piece to determine if it is neutral, positive or negative.
8. It can help train other NLP (natural language models) for specific use.
9. It can write code!

How can AI and ChatGPT be used for training?

ChatGPT has the potential to be a valuable tool in training in all industry sectors. Right now, we are only at the beginning of what this powerful tool can do. ChatGPT can currently give pointers on how to write creative posts and even come up with ideas for starting a YouTube channel. These same principles can be used when thinking about training. 

Planning Your Training using AI technology

In all areas of life, professional and educational, a more time saving, effective approach is always welcomed. ChatGPT can be taught all the information needed for a training course. Using the dataset it has it can then: 

• Easily structure material into smaller bites without losing the essential information.
• Take the course material from multiple sources.
• Give pointers on discussion topics.
• Generate practice questions and quizzes.
• Use chatbots to answer any questions about the training material.

What areas of learning and training can use ChatGPT?

While this form of technology is relatively new and unproven when it comes to learning and training, there are some key areas that are particularly well suited to technology and ChatGPT. Here are some simple ways that AI can be used in learning and Continuing Professional Development (CPD).

Personalized learning

ChatGPT can personalize training for individual learners. Depending on a learner’s answer, ChatGPT can analyse areas in need of improvement and generate content to address those areas. It also ensures that section is understood before moving on to the next step. As we all learn in different ways and at different speeds, this is important to ensure everyone gets access to gain the same knowledge. Find out more

Gamification

ChatGPT has the ability to gamify training. By generating quizzes and games, ChatGPT can make learning fun and more engaging. Learners can test their new skills through quizzes and are offered rewards. Find out more

Onboarding

New employees can be provided with specific company training and information on company policies and culture. ChatGPT can also generate workplace hand books which is increasingly useful for companies with remote workers.

Virtual Training

In a professional or educational setting, ChatGPT can be used to provide virtual training, generating content, and answering questions and include real time comments or guidance.

Language training

As ChatGPT has the ability to interact with users in a natural way as well as being able to translate, this can be used in learning a new language. ChatGPT can generate responses and correct grammatical errors.

Soft Skills

As ChatGPT has the ability to determine the sentiment of text, it can help with areas such as communication and leadership. As it can respond to the user in a natural way, it is an excellent tool for role playing and gives everyone the opportunity to be included, even in their own home.

Accessibility

ChatGPT gives all learners the opportunity to learn as it can generate content in a number of different formats, text, audio and video, enabling those with disabilities or with specific needs.

On the Job training

New techniques and procedures can be explained more succinctly across all sectors, whether it be coding in the tech industry or new advanced medical procedures in healthcare.

Drawbacks and disadvantages of using AI in training?

While we’re still in the early days of AI, there are still a number of disadvantages and potential drawbacks we need to be aware of, such as:

No personal connection

Whether we work or study remotely, we are all still human and need interaction. Learning with AI, gives us no personal connection to our peer group. In work or in education, a personal connection helps comradery, culture and a sense of belonging.

Dataset could be out of date

At the time of writing, ChatGPT is limited to a data knowledge bank up to 2021. It doesn’t have facts or information after this point. Therefore, if you want to do on-board training for your staff through ChatGPT, you may have to teach it what you need it to know. For example: if you started a business in 2022, it will not know anything about your company. Ensuring that you can teach ChatGPT about your organisation can be time consuming, especially double checking all the relevant information.

Liable to have mistakes

While ChatGPT is an excellent resource, it currently cannot be relied upon. Besides the dataset possibly being out of date, it also acts like a human to find links between prompts. These conclusions can be inaccurate. As ChatGPT can be trained with accurate facts, it can also be trained with inaccurate facts. A good example of this is autocorrect on your phone. If you keep spelling a word incorrectly, even though the phone spells it correctly, the phone thinks the incorrect way must be how you are supposed to do it.

Time and Investment

Any training course must be cost effective for the provider or organisation. Setting up a training course using AI may not be worth the time and monetary outlay, especially if you have a small workforce.

Employment

While there is a huge potential for new jobs and roles within the AI tech sector depending on the industry you work in, there is a possibility that people may lose jobs as a result.

We are just at the start of what AI technology can do and the ability to process large datasets and respond to the user in similar language is a game-changer. No doubt, as we move forward with ChatGPT and other technological advancements, the ability to incorporate these into our business and personal lives will continue to grow. Bringing these into our workplace and training will advance the need for trainers and course providers to constantly update their knowledge in order to provide the best possible training for learners. But it also opens a creative avenue to enable us to learn through exciting new training channels.

Become a CPD accredited training provider

We hope this article was helpful. Established in 1996, The CPD Certification Service is the world’s leading and largest CPD accreditation organisation working across all industry sectors. If you are looking to provide training courses or events that may be suitable for Continuing Professional Development, please contact our team to discuss in more detail.

Alternatively, if you are looking for a free online CPD record tool to help manage, track and log your ongoing learning, as well as store your professional training records and attendance certificates in one simple place, go to the myCPD Portal page.