Using AI to Work Smarter at the Office and at Home

As a corporate communications professional, I’m not writing code, architecting systems or sitting in sprint reviews. But in my role supporting Cox Automotive’s product and technology organization, I do spend my days surrounded by some of the most innovative team members in the business. Somewhere along the way, that environment started to influence how I think — not just about my work, but about my life outside the office, too.

Cox Automotive has long been a leader in AI, and as we continued to invest in and transform our products with AI, I watched our engineers and product leaders light up over what is becoming possible. That enthusiasm is contagious, and it got me thinking: why couldn’t that apply to me too?

I’m not building the next AI-powered product, but I am someone with a full plate, high expectations and a constant drive to do my job well. What if AI could help me open up possibilities in my work and, honestly, in my everyday life?

So I started experimenting, and what I learned helped me rethink a lot of how I operate.

What using AI looks like in a communications role

My job involves a lot of writing and synthesizing. On any given day, I’m drafting and refining communication plans, narratives, scripts, internal articles, emails, talking points, announcements and more. I’m also constantly taking input from different stakeholders, identifying the relevant details and shaping messages that land clearly for my audiences. 

AI has made parts of my process faster.

When I’m preparing materials for a leadership presentation, I’ll use AI to pressure-test my approach, start an outline or even get a rough first draft on the page so I have something to react to, refine and make my own — rather than staring at a blank document waiting for the words to come. When I need to pull out common themes from a long list of employee questions, it can do in minutes what used to take me an hour.

This gives me back time to put toward the things AI can’t do: knowing my audience, reading the room, building trust and sensing the nuance in a message that’s technically correct but not quite right. The true value of our communications work lives in that judgment layer — and that part doesn’t change.

How I use AI responsibly 

It’s easy to get excited about what AI can do and overlook the responsibility of fact-checking and thinking critically when using it.

AI is flawed — and it can be confidently wrong. In communications, an incorrect fact or a misattributed quote erodes trust quickly, and writing that is clearly AI generated with no human effort or judgement behind it does not add value or serve anyone.

I treat AI output as a starting point, not a finished product. I verify and refine, and when a communication goes out, I’m accountable for every word in it, regardless of how it was created.

Responsibility also extends to being thoughtful about protecting sensitive information and only using approved internal AI tools, grounded in our company’s code of conduct.

 Where AI helps me at home 

As AI became a daily part of my work life, I started using it at home, too. As a military spouse who often manages the household solo during deployments and trainings, AI became a practical sidekick that saves me time (and sanity!) and frees up bandwidth to enjoy more time with my family and friends.

For example, I use it to build weekly meal plans around what’s already in my fridge — and then generate a grocery list for any missing ingredients from that. I use it to add all of my kids’ sports and school events from various sources into one shared calendar. I also used it to research activities for my kids, sort through options before making a big purchase, plan vacations and put together my workout plans.

All these little administrative tasks add up, and that breathing room, especially in the harder, busier weeks, is exactly what I need.

Why I felt empowered to lean into AI at Cox 

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I started experimenting with AI in my personal life after being immersed in a workplace that values giving their employees time and space to innovate. Cox both invested in the tools, but also in helping team members across all disciplines understand what’s possible and feel encouraged to try.

At Cox, the message from leadership has never been that AI is only for people in tech — it’s been to figure out where this works for each of us. My manager and team reinforced that mindset by openly sharing ideas, lessons learned and practical ways in which they were experimenting, which made it feel a lot easier to explore what AI could look like in my own work.

For me, it turns out it fits in a lot of places. And the habits I’ve built at work — staying curious, checking my outputs, thinking critically, knowing where human judgment still leads — are the same ones I’ve carried into everything else.

AI has helped create more room for the most important and rewarding parts of my work and life. When used thoughtfully, it can take some of the friction out of the everyday — whether that’s outlining a communication plan, organizing a family schedule or simply getting unstuck faster. For me, that’s what working smarter really means: using new tools with curiosity and care, while keeping people, judgment and purpose at the center.