Four questions that reveal whether your AI training is working

January 5, 2025 · Tommi Raitio

Most companies have announced something about AI by now. A town hall slide. A pilot program. Maybe a lunch-and-learn nobody attended.

But announcements are not adoption. And adoption is what decides whether your company figures this out or falls behind.

Here is a simple way to find out where you actually stand: ask your employees four yes-or-no questions.

Question 1: “Have you been in a workshop where your team built AI workflows for your real work?”

Not a demo. Not a generic “intro to ChatGPT” session. A working session where people brought actual tasks from their actual jobs and left with something usable.

Most AI training fails here. It is too abstract. People watch someone else do impressive things, nod along, then go back to their desks and do nothing different.

What helps is specificity. Teams need to work on their own problems, in the room, with help on hand when they get stuck.

If most of your employees would answer “no” to this question, your training is probably theater.

Question 2: “Do you have someone who helps you figure out how to use AI in your job?”

Learning a new tool is one thing. Figuring out where it fits into your work is another.

What most people need is someone who understands their role well enough to say: “Here is where AI would actually save you time,” or “That is not a good use case, do not bother.”

This does not have to be a dedicated AI coach. It could be a manager, a peer, or someone from another team who has figured things out. The point is that someone exists and is reachable.

Without this, people either waste hours on dead ends or give up after their first failed experiment.

Question 3: “Do your leaders talk openly about how AI will change your business?”

Not vague statements about “staying competitive.” Specific conversations about what might change, what will not, and what is still uncertain.

Silence from leadership gets interpreted. Usually as “they do not know” or “they are not telling us.” Neither reading helps.

The best thing leaders can do is think out loud. Share what they are seeing. Admit what they do not know yet. Invite input from people closer to the work.

The point is to make AI a normal topic, something discussed openly rather than only in crisis mode.

Question 4: “Is your manager skilled at using AI in their own work?”

This one matters more than most companies realize.

Managers set the tone. If they are using AI visibly, in meetings, in their communication, in how they solve problems, it signals permission for everyone else to do the same.

If they are not, it signals the opposite. People notice when their boss has not touched the tools they are being told to adopt.

You cannot train your way around this. Managers need to go first, make mistakes in public, and show that experimentation is expected.

What to do with the answers

If you are a leader, run this as an actual survey. Anonymous. Simple. Four questions.

The results will tell you whether your AI efforts are landing or just making noise.

If the answers are mostly “no,” that is useful information. People have heard about AI. What they have not had is help to use it.