Using AI as a partner
Most content creators using AI are barely scratching the surface of what it can do
Gary Bloomer | SHAKING THE TREE # 291
I use AI.
I use it to create article drafts and images.
Parts of this article were sketched out with Google Gemini.
Every month, AI saves me countless hours and for me, platforms such as DeepSeek, Gemini, Claude, and Chat GPT have become an important part of the way I work.
I get that many content creators and purists are against the use of AI. That’s their choice. Perhaps you’re one of those people? That’s OK. I’m glad the purist way works for you. I used to be in that camp too. Before I discovered what it could do, similarly, I thought AI wasn’t a good idea.
But over the last few years AI has become an important tool and if you’re only just beginning to dip your toes into the waters of content creation, or if you’re only using ChatGPT, we need to talk.
Most content creators treat AI platforms like a glorified librarian.
If you’re using AI as a sophisticated search engine—as a way to find stuff faster or as a tool to shorten texts you’re too busy to read, you’re not using it to its fullest potential.
If you’re just asking Claude or Deepseek or Chat GPT for summaries, you’re using a Ferrari to drive to the mailbox. instead, start using AI as a creative and collaborative partner.
A search engine finds information. That’s what it’s for. It’s a sort of obedient moron: it does what it’s told and shows you what’s relevant, what’s ranking, and what’s popular, all of which is great. But you don’t want great. You want brilliant.
To be brilliant you don’t need a search engine, you need a creative partner. It’s time to stop looking for recaps and highlights and it’s time to start looking for a competitive advantage.
The search engine trap
When you treat AI like a search engine, you’re the one doing all the heavy lifting.
You’re the one who has to connect the dots, find the strategy, and figure out the “So what?” angle. A search engine is passive. It waits for you to ask for a fact. It’s a tool for retrieval. But the world isn’t interested in what you can retrieve; it’s interested in what you can synthesize.
Shifting to high-level partnership
A high-level partner doesn’t just give you the what. They challenge your why.
A partner looks at your messy data and they see a repeatable, a logical framework, or a series of hidden connections. Then, they’ll ask you if you’d like them to connect this dot to that dot—and maybe, the dots you’re being asked about are dots you’d never have thought of connecting—hence the idea of synthesis.
When you’re using AI as a partner you’re giving it permission to look at your polished pitch and find the jagged, dangerous assumptions lurking below the waterline.
To use AI to its fullest potential, you have to move from Question/Answer mode to Collaboration/Creation mode.
Instead of using a tool, start looking at AI as briefing a consultant.
A summarist asks: “What social media content is getting attention right now?”
The partner asks: “Based on these 2026 trends, what is the one contrarian move my competitors are too scared to make?”
If all you’re doing is using AI to summarize lists and sum up meeting minutes you’re essentially hiring a world-class architect to sweep the floor. It’s a waste of potential.
To move from using a tool to collaborating with a partner, you have to push the AI into the messy, uncomfortable areas of your business—the parts where decisions are made, where risks are weighed, and where long-term value is built.
The partnership framework: three ways to level up
If you want to stop being a user of AI and start being a partner, you need to change your attitudes and assumptions, and you need to change your prompts from queries to challenges.
Instead of asking for data, demand logic: Too many users spend too much time asking AI for the facts when what they really need to be doing is asking AI platforms to explain the physics or the chemistry or the engineering of the situation. Why is this working? What happens if we change this input or this ingredient? Where will this direction take us? And so on.
Force perspective: We are all guilty of spending too much time in our own echo chamber where we’re comforted and reassured by our own biases and preferences. But when you use AI to step outside your experience and when you ask it to tear your ideas apart from the perspective of a skeptic, or a competitor, or a customer, suddenly the whole landscape shifts.
Build the engine: Instead of asking for the result start asking for the machine that creates the result. If the AI gives you a great email, ask for the 5-step framework it used to write that email so you can do it again and again.
A few power prompts to ignite your partnership
If any of this has piqued your interest and if you’re ready to stop searching with AI and start partnering instead, try these approaches:
1. the strategic challenge: the logic stress-test
Most plans fail because of confirmation bias. This prompt forces the AI to hunt for the structural cracks in your thinking before the market finds them.
The Power Prompt: “I am aiming to [Insert goal]. Act as a high-stakes strategy consultant with zero interest in protecting my feelings. Analyze my plan and identify 3 ‘load-bearing’ flaws in my logic. For each flaw, explain the specific chain reaction that leads to project failure.”
2. the framework extractor: the engine blueprint
We don’t want a story; we want the math. This prompt strips away the narrative fluff and leaves you with a repeatable system you can install in any part of your business.
The Power Prompt: “Forget the narrative. Strip this process down to its ‘algorithmic core.’ Map it out as a repeatable logic machine: what are the raw inputs, what are the specific binary decision-points, and what is the final measurable output?”
3. the friction audit: the stakeholder clash
If your strategy makes everyone happy, it’s probably too weak to survive the market. This prompt invites the clash between competing priorities to find the resonant truth.
The Power Prompt: “Act as a neutral arbiter of a high-stakes board meeting. Review this proposal from three conflicting angles: The CFO (obsessed with ROI and burn rate), the Creative Director (obsessed with brand soul and aesthetic purity), and the Customer (obsessed with immediate utility and removing friction). Map out the ‘Irreconcilable Differences’ between them and suggest a strategic pivot that honors the tension without diluting the product.”
4. the leverage hunter: the 80/20 sniper
Busy is often just a lazy way of avoiding high-leverage work. This prompt scans your chaotic to-do list and points a laser at the one task that actually creates a landslide of results.
The Power Prompt: “Audit this list of projects: [Insert List]. Based on the Pareto Principle, identify the single ‘Archimedes Lever’—the one task where my specific effort creates the most massive downstream impact. Explain why the other tasks are secondary distractions.”
5. the contrarian edge: the consensus breaker
If everyone agrees, there’s no margin left. This prompt pushes the AI to find the uncomfortable, profitable truths that people are too scared to say out loud.
The Power Prompt: “Review this industry data. Identify 3 ‘Inconvenient Truths’ that smart peers in my niche are currently pretending don’t exist. For each truth, explain the specific ‘Contrarian Edge’ I can gain by building a strategy that acknowledges it.”
6. the red team saboteur: stress-testing robustness
In military strategy, a Red Team is hired to find holes in a plan by attacking it. Use this to brutally audit your bulletproof ideas before you commit capital.
The Power Prompt: “Act as a hostile competitor. I am launching [Project X]. Identify the three weakest points in my rollout strategy and tell me exactly how you would exploit them to steal my market share. Don’t pull punches.”
7. the opportunity cost auditor: resource allocation
Every yes is a no to something else. This prompt surfaces the hidden costs of your choices so you can make eyes-wide-open decisions.
The Power Prompt: “Analyze my decision to [Action X]. Based on my long-term goal of [Goal Y], identify three alternative paths I am currently sacrificing. Quantify the potential value of those lost paths vs. the projected ROI of my current choice.”
8. the customer persona stress-test: empathy mapping
We usually only know the idealized version of our customers. This prompt simulates the actual friction and daily chaos of your target audience.
The Power Prompt: “Act as a skeptical, time-poor [Customer Persona]. I am sending you this [Email/Offer]. Tell me the exact moment you would stop reading and why. What is the one ‘inconvenient truth’ about my product that would make you hesitate to buy?”
9. the skills gap architect: future-proofing the engine
If you’re building beyond 2026 (2030 will be here before you know it), you need a roadmap to get better. This identifies the bridge between your current talent and your future requirements.
The Power Prompt: “Given my 2027 vision of [Vision], and my current skill set of [Skills], identify the three ‘missing links’ in my technical or strategic ability. Create a 6-month learning roadmap with specific milestones to close these gaps.”
10. the landmine detector: anti-pattern recognition
Success leaves clues, but failure leaves a trail a mile wide. Ask for the blueprint of a disaster to ensure your path to the finish line is clear.
The Power Prompt: “Act as a forensic business analyst. For the [Industry] sector, identify 3 ‘siren song’ strategies—moves that appear like smart shortcuts toward [Goal] but historically lead to systemic failure. Analyze my current approach and tell me if I’m unknowingly walking into one of these traps.”
There’s more, but you get the idea. Of the millions of people using AI, few of them are using these sorts of prompts, which gives you a massive advantage IF you’re prepared to change your thinking of and behaviors towards AI as a create partner.
The bottom line is this:
While a bullet point summary is a dead end, a partnership is a roadmap.
What would you rather have? An obedient moron that does only what you tell it to do? Or a partner that will tell you the truth you’re too close to see and that you’re too deaf to hear? A partner is there to test your assumptions and to push you toward a decision that might be the change you’ve been looking for but couldn’t find.
If your AI isn’t making you rethink your Tuesday morning, or upsetting the apple cart of your closely held but destructive beliefs you’re not asking the right questions.
Stop asking your AI to read for you, and start asking it to think with you.
As always, thanks for reading.
—Gary
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P.S. If you found this useful, share it with another creator who needs an ego check (in a nice way). Want more unfiltered takes on content creation? Join my newsletter. No fluff, just the stuff that works.
Next time on Shaking the Tree: Ditching the money script
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Originally from the U.K., Gary Bloomer is a writer, branding advocate, marketing specialist, and an award-winning graphic designer.
His design work has been included in Creative Review (one of the UK’s largest design magazines). Since 2009, he has answered over 5,000 marketing and business questions in the Know-How Exchange of MarketingProfs.com, placing him among the top 3% of contributors. He lives in Wilmington, Delaware, USA.