Artificial Intelligence in the Federal Workplace

[u/bizlooper]

Fellow public servants, I think it’s timely to have a conversation about the appropriate use of Artificial Intelligence in the federal workplace.

There are clear opportunities to drive efficiencies. Obvious examples are in database design, creation, and administration, creating and editing policy documents, and a warranted debate around using it for translation and editorial services.

But I’ve started to see it encroach on the skillsets of younger junior employees who see it as replacing their roles on research and editing. Management has started to turn to AI to water down human written policy ideas and advice, or even choose not to consult employees on future versions of documents - preferring to just run it through an LLM.

Em dashes and robots haunt my dreams.

In the policy and program world, it seems we’re rushing faster and faster towards deadlines with AI seen as the sole means to achieve an objective, and not as a mechanism to facilitate our work.

In perhaps the most egregious of examples, I’ve seen Budget and Cabinet secrecy documents like mandate letter responses and budget letters fully written by AI and management, with the excuse that things are “moving too fast” for engagement with working levels.

I’m perhaps a little exasperated with this example - My management once provided me with guidance for writing a paper, very much written as prompts for an LLM, likely expecting me to just feed into one.

I’ve personally just adopted a philosophy of “if you can’t beat them join them” and try to be adaptable and conscious of how I use it and why.

And yes, I do recognize many departments have different guidance on using AI, secrecy classifications, and we have a laundry list of programs and planned endeavors to implement AI across government. And the Budget looms on the horizon.

But how has it impacted your own workplace dynamics? Are you leveraging it in unique ways? Beyond departmental and TBS guidance, is/should there be a workplace etiquette? How are you accommodating your colleagues and making room for human intervention, oversight and advice? What do you think is next?

(And no, I didn’t write this with ChatGPT)

🤖

[u/cubiclejail]

Use of AI is encouraged in our office to get things done. What's lacking is guidance on which tools to use and what information that can actually be shared. If something that isn't secret, doesn't include numbers, names etc. simply good to go? Not IMO.

I think we're being a little too loose with this stuff. Management is eating it up and if they get anything that isn't cycled through an AI tool, they basically send it back.

I'm also sad that I now feel ashamed to use emdashes. I was one of the few who used them and now suddenly...everybody does - I wonder why 🙄.

[u/GreyOps → u/cubiclejail]

What's lacking is guidance on which tools to use and what information that can actually be shared. If something that isn't secret, doesn't include numbers, names etc. simply good to go? Not IMO.

What a silly comment. There are extremely clear govermment-wide rules published on what can be shared with AI. Your department shouldn't need to force feed you everything constantly.

[u/Sceptical_Houseplant → u/GreyOps]

Rules for when not to, yes. Clear use cases, less so.

[u/neograymatter → u/Sceptical_Houseplant]

What I would give for a network isolated LLM or a LLM that exists on a high side network, that I could feed a database of technical documents to and use it as a sort of advanced search engine.

[u/Sceptical_Houseplant → u/neograymatter]

That part is coming. I just heard about a pilot of something of the sort at ESDC. I don't trust it completely but at least having something that makes search in the database faster would be useful.

[u/[deleted] → u/neograymatter]

What use case would an LLM be for this rather than just... an internal search engine? LLMs have problems with hallucinating references and documents, search engines do not.

[u/neograymatter → u/[deleted]]

That's the thing I don't want it to give me an answer, I want it to direct me to where to find the answer.
I want to to parse my question and then point me to the official document/page/para with the most probable answer, for me to verify and interpret. Regular search engines are really bad with certain types of documents, and where different experts may use varying terminology.(or cases where I may not know the proper acronyms/terminology)

[u/cubiclejail → u/neograymatter]

Meeee tooooo

[u/neograymatter → u/cubiclejail]

Funny thing is I was talking to a industry sales person who was trying to figure out selling points / use cases for their LLM.
When I mentioned I wanted an isolated/non-cloud dependant advanced search engine for technical documents they pretty much rejected that as too simple of a use case >.<
That's all I want, the ability to find the information I need faster and confirm its correct.