converge · Team Building, Planning · 25–40 min · 3-7 people · medium energy

AI Team Skills Map

At the start of a project, a team works through a conversation with an AI that acts as a teammate. It asks about the project, then asks each person to name their skills, then asks how the team could split the work given those skills. The conversation ends with a table of names, skills and possible tasks, which the team edits and adopts.

When to use AI Team Skills Map

Use at a project kick-off when a new or mixed team needs to plan who does what based on what people can actually do.

What it solves

Tasks get assigned by who volunteers first, not by who is best placed, and hidden skills stay hidden.

How to run AI Team Skills Map, step by step

  1. One person pastes the team-structure prompt into an AI chat and shares their screen (2 min).
  2. Describe the project in detail when the AI asks (5 min).
  3. Each member names their skills and relevant experience; the typist enters them (8-10 min).
  4. Discuss how to organise tasks around those skills; ask the AI for suggestions only if stuck (8-10 min).
  5. Have the AI produce the table, then edit it as a team until everyone agrees with their row (5-10 min).

Materials needed

  • AI chat tool
  • Prepared team-structure prompt
  • Shared screen

Facilitator tips

  • Ask people to name skills outside their job title too. That is where the surprises are.
  • The team owns the final table, not the AI. Change anything that does not fit.
  • Point out gaps the table reveals: skills nobody has that the project needs.

Common pitfalls

  • The typist summarises other people's skills instead of letting them speak for themselves.
  • The team accepts the AI's task split without discussion.

Variations

  • Do the skills round without AI on sticky notes first, then let the AI propose a split for comparison.

Running it online or hybrid

One person shares a screen with the AI chat and types for the team; everyone else talks.

What it produces

A table with each member's name, skills and expertise, and the tasks they could take on.

Origin

Adapted from the Team Structure Prompt in Ethan Mollick and Lilach Mollick's Assigning AI: Seven Approaches for Students with Prompts (Wharton, 2023), grounded in Richard Hackman's research on team effectiveness. — source

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