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Business Insider
11 minutes ago
- Business Insider
OpenAI employees share their 3 favorite tips for using ChatGPT
If you ever happen to see Nick Turley, the head of ChatGPT at OpenAI, muttering to himself on a weekday morning, it might be because he's talking to a chatbot. Turley said that ChatGPT's voice feature is his favorite tip for using the technology on a recent episode of the OpenAI podcast. "On my way to work, I'll use it to process my own thoughts. With some luck, and I think this works most days, I'll have the restructured list of to-dos by the time I actually get there," he said, adding that the voice feature isn't yet mainstream because there are a bunch of small "kinks" still. He said he finds it valuable to force himself to articulate his thoughts aloud, and wants to see the feature improve next year. Mark Chen, OpenAI's chief research officer, said on the podcast that he's a fan of the deep research feature, especially before an introduction. "When I go meet someone new, when I'm going to talk to someone about AI, I just preflight topics," Chen said. "I think the model can do a really good job of contextualizing who I am, who I'm about to meet, and what things we might find interesting." And podcast host Andrew Mayne, who was formerly OpenAI's science communicator and worked on ChatGPT, said he uses the technology when he's out at a restaurant. "I take a photograph of a menu and I'm like, 'Help me plan a meal or whatever, I'm trying to stick to a diet," Mayne said. Turley, however, cautioned against using the same trick for the wine list. "It keeps embarrassing me with hallucinated wine recommendations, and I go order it and they're like, 'Never heard of this one,'" he said. Corporate executives across companies are using AI in their daily lives, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is no different. Altman said on the "ReThinking" podcast in January that he uses it in "the boring ways," for things like processing emails and summarizing documents. When Altman spoke on the OpenAI podcast in June, he said that he uses ChatGPT "constantly" as a father. At the time, he said he was mainly using it to research developmental stages. "Clearly, people have been able to take care of babies without ChatGPT for a long time," Altman said. "I don't know how I would have done that."
Indianapolis Star
18 minutes ago
- Indianapolis Star
Is Amazon Prime membership required to shop Prime Day 2025 deals, sale? What is included?
Amazon's best sale of the year for shopping deals is almost here, as Prime Day 2025 is just days away. If you haven't checked out Amazon lately or don't have an Amazon Prime membership, now might be a good time to renew or sign-up, as a few changes have been made to Prime Day this year. Here's what we know about Amazon Prime membership benefits, Prime Day 2025 and more: Amazon Prime Days are open exclusively to all customers with an Amazon Prime membership, providing access to all Amazon shopping deals during Prime Day. Visit the Amazon Prime signup page. Sometimes, a free trial up to 30 days may be available. Free trials require a current, valid credit card. Some payment options are unavailable, including: Three pricing models for Amazon Prime memberships include: Shop Prime Day 2025 deals for 4 days in 2025 Prime Access provides EBT, Medicaid, SNAP and other select government assistance recipients an opportunity to qualify for a discounted Prime membership at $6.99 per month. Visit to verify your eligibility. Here's what is included in an Amazon Prime membership, according to Amazon Prime members can cancel anytime online at or by contacting customer service. Subscriptions on Prime Video remain until the membership ends. To cancel third-party memberships, customers must contact the entity to cancel a membership. For example, if you signed up for Amazon Prime through Google Play using Android, patrons must cancel the subscription through Google Subscription services. The Amazon customer service support phone number is (888) 280-4331. Amazon Prime Day will run from Tuesday, July 8, through Friday, July 11, 2025. Prime Day 2025 begins at 12:01 a.m. PT (3:01 a.m. ET), Tuesday, July 8. Prime Day 2025 ends at 11:59 p.m. PT (2:59 ET), Tuesday, July 11. Shop Amazon Prime Day deals July 8-11 Prime Day 2025 deals will be avalable in 26 countries including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the U.S. and the UK. Prime members in Ireland can find Prime Day deals on and members in Colombia can shop at Yes, Amazon's Prime Day sale will run for four days in 2025, doubling the number of hours to shop the sale's deals from 48 to 96. Besides adding four more days, Prime for Young Adults is offering a 6-month trial for students. Also, "Today's Big Deals" will provide themed daily drops and discounts at midnight PT each day of the sale. If that's not enough, customers can use Alexa+ to track the best shopping deals during the event.
Business Insider
25 minutes ago
- Business Insider
Amazon rolls out a stricter performance review process — with culture as a key metric
Amazon is leaning harder on its "Leadership Principles" to rate employee performance, as CEO Andy Jassy continues to create a more disciplined workforce at the tech company. Starting this quarter's mid-year review cycle, Amazon managers will use a three-tiered system to evaluate how effectively corporate employees demonstrate the company's core values in their work, according to an internal document obtained by Business Insider. Although the Leadership Principles have long been central to Amazon's culture and considered in performance reviews, this is the first time they've been formally embedded into the evaluation process. Amazon relies on its 16 LPs, which stress things like customer focus and cost discipline, to guide nearly all business decisions. As part of this shift, Amazon is streamlining the rating scales for the other two evaluation criteria ("performance" and "potential"). Together with how employees use LPs, these factors determine an Overall Value (OV) score for each corporate employee, which influences future raises and whether they may be placed on a performance improvement plan. The internal guideline said the changes will "improve our ability to identify top talent and further strengthen our culture." It added that only 5% of the employees will be eligible for the top "role model" grade when measuring their LP behavior. "By making Leadership Principles a formal input to Overall Value ratings and increasing the granularity of the input rating combinations, the updated process helps us strengthen the connection between performance and culture," the guideline added. The move is part of a wider wave among tech giants to rethink how they manage performance and reward employees. Microsoft has a new 2-year rehire ban on ousted underperforming employees. Both Google and Meta have also made policy changes that better reward high performers this year. More discipline The initiative demonstrates Jassy's ongoing commitment to cultivating a more rigorous workforce and a more cohesive corporate culture. In the past year, Jassy has enforced a full return-to-office policy, reduced management layers, and updated its pay model to better reward top talent. Last year, he also shared a video series explaining each LP, and recently warned that AI will reduce Amazon's workforce because of efficiency gains. Amazon's spokesperson Sam Stephenson told BI that the company regularly reviews its performance review process to "ensure it best supports the growth and development of our employees." "Our unique culture, which is rooted in our Leadership Principles, drives the innovation we deliver for customers each day," Stephenson said. "These changes streamline the process for managers and help to ensure greater consistency." 'High-judgment' decision Amazon's performance review policy has long been controversial. Some employees have cited concerns over limited oversight and the potential for misuse, with one former employee describing the system as " predatory and opaque." Some people have also criticized Amazon's cutthroat "stack-ranking" culture, in which a fixed percentage of the workforce is replaced every year. Amazon managers group their employees in five broad buckets of performance tiers: Top Tier (TT), Highly Valued 3 (HV3), Highly Valued 2 (HV2), Highly Valued 1 (HV1), and Least Effective (LE). Teams with more than 50 employees should categorize 20% as TT, 15% as HV3, 25% as HV2, 35% as HV1, and 5% as LE, the internal guideline said. Amazon seems to recognize the nuanced nature of performance evaluations. The internal guideline urges managers to dedicate sufficient time to reviewing each employee to ensure accurate assessments. "Evaluating employees is a high-judgment decision," the guideline said. "You should invest sufficient time in gathering comprehensive and objective feedback to ensure accuracy and minimize unconscious bias."
