Imperative Scales Their Expert Team through Generative AI

At a Glance

Imperative is a workforce engagement platform that uses meaningful conversation and connection to enable employees and organizations to thrive. Founded by Aaron Hurst, the foremost expert on purpose at work, Imperative has been leveraging the science of purpose to build a platform that is connecting employees for guided, meaningful conversations – the kind that strengthens teams, breaks down silos, improves collaboration and reduces turnover. 

In response to market demands for growing use cases and the desire to highly personalize the platform experience, Imperative recognized the need to expand its expert conversation content.  Facing the challenge of multiplying their content creation tenfold, Imperative identified Generative AI as a potential solution. Partnering with GenUI, Imperative developed a long-term Generative AI strategy specifically designed to meet their unique requirements and leverage their expertise in this evolving market. Guided by that strategy, they developed Imperative’s first internal tool leveraging GPT-4 and the OpenAI API. 

Key takeaways:

• Developed Roadmap: Outlined a focused and aligned strategy for Al acceleration, laying a solid foundation for future innovation.
• Delivered a Rapid Prototype: Achieved a functional prototype in just three weeks, demonstrating the speed and efficiency of Al-driven development.
• Demonstrated Immediate Value: Frontline associates quickly realized the benefits of Al, with faster draft creation significantly enhancing productivity.

Charting the Course to Generative AI Acceleration

GenUI and Imperative initiated their collaboration with a deep-dive strategic analysis to determine how the available Generative AI platforms could best help Imperative. The combined team embarked on a thorough assessment of Imperative's current strengths, opportunities, and challenges. By distilling these insights down to their essence, they ensured that the subsequent strategic planning would closely align with Imperative's objectives.

After establishing a thorough understanding of the landscape, GenUI explored a number of ways to apply the technology to benefit  Imperative in both the short and long term. They conducted experiments to test some of these options, and once the best paths became clear, GenUI provided Imperative with a comprehensive set of findings and a proposed roadmap.

From Vision to Reality: Building a Useful PoC with GPT-4

Following the strategic planning phase, GenUI and Imperative embarked on a pragmatic approach: developing a usable proof-of-concept (PoC) to help Imperative’s expert content team generate first drafts quickly. The plan involved using OpenAI’s GPT-4 service, prompt engineering and a simple Azure Function API. They designed the user experience to leverage Imperative’s existing content tools to facilitate adoption and minimize development costs.

The primary aim of the PoC was to enable Imperative's content team to translate their expert knowledge into first-draft content with unprecedented efficiency. The envisioned workflow involved Imperative providing an outline of content to the AI system, which would then generate a first draft. Accelerating this early step in their content process proved very effective as reaching a first draft was often a very time-consuming part of their creative process. 

With Imperative's help, GenUI developed the prototype in just three weeks. After designing how the UX would integrate with Imperative’s existing tools, they created a “spike” of the PoC—a technical proof to mitigate risks and validate the plan. Next, GenUI fine-tuned the AI prompts with feedback from Imperative's creative team. By the third week, Imperative began actively using the PoC, offering GenUI further feedback and refinement suggestions.

The resulting tool offered two significant benefits. The team could now generate first-draft content in mere minutes, dramatically reducing a process that previously took weeks. Additionally, they gained the flexibility to rapidly iterate on ideas by adjusting outlines and resubmitting them to the AI, enabling exploration of a much wider range of options than before. This PoC marked not only a substantial advancement in content production but also an essential first step in Imperative's broader Generative AI strategy.

Forging the Future: Imperative's Journey Integrating AI and Human Expertise

Imperative and GenUI’s collaboration showcases a pioneering approach in leveraging GPT-4 via the OpenAI API, to revolutionize content creation and organizational effectiveness. Together they created a usable proof-of-concept (PoC) that seamlessly blended human creativity with AI efficiency. This tool empowered Imperative's content team to rapidly transform high-level content outlines into first-draft quality content, dramatically accelerating the creative process while maintaining the company's high standards. At the same time, this PoC provided Imperative’s team with the ability to explore a wider range of ideas more efficiently, ensuring that the final content will always adhere to Imperative's exacting standards and reflect their commitment to quality and detail.