An analysis found that how people use AI tools, rather than how often they use them, separates performance.

Harvard Business Review's online edition reported on March 19 that KPMG, working with a research team at the University of Texas at Austin, analysed 1.4 million AI prompts generated by 2,500 employees over eight months. The researchers used OpenAI's reasoning model ChatGPT o1 to evaluate each conversation and extracted more than 50 variables.

The analysis found that employees classified as advanced users accounted for only 5 percent of the total. KPMG said 90 percent of all employees were using AI regularly, but only a small number used it in a sophisticated way.

Advanced users shared 4 common behavioural patterns.

First, they held long, iterative conversations with AI and wrote long, specific prompts from the start. Second, they used AI as a reasoning partner rather than a simple answer tool. They used strategic techniques such as assigning roles, providing output examples and iterating improvements. Third, when delegating complex, multi-step tasks to AI, they clearly set out goals and constraints. Fourth, they used AI not only for simple tasks such as writing assistance but across areas including idea generation, analysis and technical advice.

The analysis also produced an unexpected result. Junior employees are typically considered more familiar with AI tools, but advanced users were more common among managers and above. Junior employees had a higher share of AI use for personal purposes outside work and were more likely to use it without a strategic approach.

Based on the findings, KPMG revamped its talent development and performance management systems. It focused on building sophisticated usage habits rather than simply increasing adoption. It introduced training based on real work scenarios. It also set different expectations for AI use by business unit, including audit, tax and advisory.

KPMG said, "Providing AI tools alone is not enough," adding, "Clearly defining what good AI use is and teaching and reinforcing those behaviours leads to organisation-wide performance."