You know something's wrong when you see this

You know it’s bad when people wear shirts like this👇 to conferences.

Google democratized answers, but didn't eliminate the burden of finding them.

Why does this matter?

There's a treacherous "effort journey" we all embark on while at work, and it relates to a choice we're faced with again and again on the job:

We can either make assumptions OR ask the important questions (and then put in the work to find the answer).

But asking is hard. With the "promise" of LLMs, we thought maybe it'd get easier. But they've only exacerbated the problem, creating an abridged version of that treacherous "effort journey":

1. Have a problem that requires an answer {Effort = Low 🟢}

2. Be sure I can use {insert LLM} for this particular problem {Effort = High 🔴}

3. Think through how to formulate my problem into the right questions, prompts, or search terms {Effort = High 🔴}

4. Remember all pieces of context needed to get an actually-useful output {Effort = High 🔴}

5. Didn’t find what I was looking for / misunderstood my intention, so try to re-explain in different words {Effort = High (+ Frustrating) 🔴😡}

6. Get slightly better results, but still don't trust responses and still need to go deeper / in different directions {Effort = High 🔴}

7. Repeat step #6 another 20 times {Effort = High 🔴} Just do the work myself {Effort = High 🔴}

Curiosity, defeated.

From childhood's "because I said so", to education's "memorize answers", to society's "must know the answer", to technology’s "garbage in, garbage out"... 

We've architected the perfect incuriosity machine.

So in the spirit of reinvigorating curiosity, let’s ask a few questions:

What if…we didn’t have to choose between fast, affordable, easy, and accurate to get answers we need?
How might we…remove the barriers to asking more of the questions that fall between the big research projects and the low-leverage, low-risk ones – which could very well transform our business?
I wonder if…there’s a way to leverage the best of technology and humans to accomplish both of those – and go further, faster?

Researching trends, competitors, the market, and other important strategy questions shouldn’t be so hard, slow, manual, or cost-prohibitive. 

We all know there HAS to be a better way – and we’re working around the clock to bring it to life. 

We’d love to hear more about how your team is leveraging search engines, LLMs, and other solutions to get the insights you need to move quickly in an environment where speed matters more than ever. 

Grab time with us here to share your thoughts?

Victoria

PS. This shirt is real. But the joke’s on them, because if you’re reading this, that means you dared to ask the hard questions, and demanded a way to get better answers. Welcome to Wonder(land)!