Treat AI Like Your Summer Intern

Artificial intelligence can feel like a big, scary concept—especially when every conversation about it seems to involve either predictions that it will revolutionize the world or warnings that it will destroy it.

For event professionals, AI is much simpler than that: it is a tool. And one of the best ways to understand how to use that tool is to think of AI as your summer intern.

Your summer intern may be smart, eager, and remarkably fast. They can help you accomplish more in less time, bring fresh ideas to the table, and take repetitive work off your plate. But they are also new. They do not automatically understand your company, your clients, your voice, your standards, or the nuances of your work.

You would not hand your summer intern the keys to the company on their first day and say, “Good luck.” You should not do that with AI either.

AI Needs Clear Direction

AI is only as effective as the instructions and information it receives. In other words: garbage in, garbage out.

If you tell an AI tool, “Write a proposal for my event,” you may receive something that looks polished but is generic, inaccurate, or completely wrong for your client. If you explain the type of event, the client’s priorities, the services you provide, your brand voice, your pricing, and what the proposal should accomplish, you are much more likely to receive something useful.

The same is true when managing people. “Help with this project” is not a clear assignment. “Review this event brief and create a first draft of the production timeline using this template” is.

Strong operators already understand how to define goals, provide context, create processes, and identify what a successful result should look like. Those skills make them especially well positioned to use AI effectively.

AI does not replace good operations. It can make great operators more efficient.

Give AI the Right Assignments

The potential uses for AI in the events industry are nearly endless. It can help with:

• Brainstorming event themes, experiences, session titles, or menu descriptions
• Drafting proposals and presentations
• Creating blog posts, social media captions, and other marketing content
• Writing or refining email responses
• Turning meeting notes into task lists
• Organizing information into timelines, checklists, or run-of-show documents
• Editing copy for clarity, tone, grammar, or length
• Reviewing website content for basic SEO opportunities
• Summarizing surveys, client questionnaires, and post-event feedback
• Creating reminders and helping prioritize next steps

The goal is not to give every task to AI simply because you can. The goal is to identify where it can save time, help you get past the blank page, organize information, or provide a starting point.

Think about how you would work with a promising intern. You might ask them to prepare the first draft of an email, research ideas for an upcoming program, or organize your notes into a usable document. You would then review their work, offer corrections, and make the final decision.

AI works best in much the same way.

Oversight Is Not Optional

With great power comes great responsibility.

AI can produce incorrect information with complete confidence. It can misunderstand context, overlook important details, or generate language that sounds professional without actually saying anything meaningful. It may also reflect biases in its source material or introduce privacy concerns if sensitive information is entered into the wrong tool.

That means human oversight is essential.

Before using AI-generated work, review it for accuracy, tone, relevance, and alignment with your organization’s policies. Verify names, dates, pricing, statistics, contract language, and other consequential details. Be thoughtful about what client, employee, financial, or proprietary information you share. If the final product represents you or your company, you remain responsible for it.

You would not let a summer intern negotiate a major contract, make an executive decision, or send an important client communication without review. AI should not be given unsupervised authority simply because it works quickly.

Help Your AI “Grow”

Over time, an intern becomes more valuable because they learn how your organization works as you provide examples, templates, feedback, and documented processes. You can do the same with AI!

You can improve and save prompts that produce good results. Provide examples of your preferred writing style. Develop templates for recurring tasks. Create clear workflows for when AI should be used, what information it needs, and who must review the output. Some organizations may even benefit from customized AI tools created for specific processes.

The better your systems, the better your results will be.

AI does not have to be intimidating, and you do not need to transform your entire organization overnight. Start with one repetitive or time-consuming task and give the tool clear instructions, review what it produces, and refine the process as you learn.

Treat AI like a capable summer intern: give it appropriate assignments, set clear expectations, supervise its work, and use its strengths wisely. It should not run your company—but with the right management, it can help you run your company better.