Documenting the work I do with AI

I use AI to work through problems and learn skills I haven’t used before. A conversation can take a long time, with several attempts before I understand the process and get a useful result. Once the task is finished, I want to keep what I learned.

It is tempting to leave the conversation there. The tool will be available the next time I need help, and I can ask again. But that means spending time retracing steps I have already worked through. It also makes it harder to explain the process to someone else.

I take notes on the steps that worked, what I learned, and the details my first prompt was missing. I include enough context to use those notes again without having to reconstruct the conversation.

Writing the process down helps me check my understanding. If I cannot explain a step, I need to ask another question or look for a better explanation. Finishing the task does not guarantee that I understand how I got there.

Those notes also give my team a way to learn the process without repeating the same back-and-forth. Someone else can follow the steps, check the reasoning, and build on the work. The knowledge stays available even if the person who first worked through it leaves.

I think this deserves time in the work itself. An hour a week spent documenting what I have learned makes it easier to return to a task and gives my team something useful to keep.