Why don’t you just write that using AI?

Anne-Marie Chisnall | May 11, 2026

It sounds straightforward enough. A blog post in 30 seconds. A month of social media content from a single prompt. A full report before your next meeting. Writing problems solved.

This ease sounds wonderful, except for the catch that most people discover too late: AI can produce words quickly — but getting it to produce words worth reading is another matter.

The problem with pressing ‘Generate’

We surveyed our consultant team and identified 30 recurring characteristics of poor AI writing. These can be summarised as:

• repeating patterns of structure, language, and punctuation
• a tendency towards the generic
• a lack of the specificity that makes writing useful and informative.

The result is content that is grammatically competent but sounds as though it’s not really ‘you’. This disconnection matters more than you might think. Writing that sounds like everyone else’s writing doesn’t differentiate your business. It doesn’t demonstrate expertise or gain trust. And, increasingly, readers can sense it — even when they can’t quite name what’s wrong.

The pressure to produce more content faster is real. Smaller teams, tighter budgets, and the quiet anxiety of wondering whether a competitor is already automating everything all reinforce the appeal of AI as a writing shortcut.

But shortcuts can have consequences that lead you astray. The question isn’t whether to use AI — it’s how to use it well.

AI alone isn’t enough

To understand why AI-generated writing often doesn’t hit the mark, it helps to know what AI is doing when it writes.

A large language model doesn’t understand language. It performs a series of numerical calculations, predicting the most statistically likely next word based on the vast body of text it was trained on. It works by pattern, probability, and prediction.

Human writing works differently. When we write, we draw on our experience, judgement, and perspective as a person. We’re not calculating the next word — we’re trying to express something real and specific. That distinction shapes the quality of ideas on the page.

AI writes by recombination. Humans write by creation. For content that is genuinely original, that difference matters.

Three ways to write better with AI

Used well, AI is a powerful writing partner. But ‘used well’ means more than typing a request into a chat window. Here’s how to make sure you can stand behind what AI helps you produce.

1. Brief your AI carefully
The quality of your output depends almost entirely on the quality of your input. Treat the prompt like a brief — the same way you’d brief a human colleague.

If you’re not sure where to start, ask the AI to help you write the brief. This technique can be very effective. Tell the AI what you’re trying to achieve and ask it to interview you — to pose the questions it needs answered before it can produce accurate and targeted copy.

Think of it as talking through a problem with a sharp colleague who happens to have read everything! The AI will often bring up angles you haven’t considered, gaps in your thinking, or assumptions worth challenging.

A rough first prompt followed by a genuine back-and-forth will almost always outperform a carefully engineered single prompt. The goal isn’t to craft the perfect prompt — it’s to build a shared understanding of what good looks like, one exchange at a time.

2. Check the facts
AI hallucinates — and it does so with complete confidence. Lawyers have cited cases that don’t exist. Researchers have quoted studies that were never published. Several major models have famously and stubbornly insisted that the word ‘strawberry’ contains only two ‘R’s.

When AI cites a statistic or references a source, verify it independently. Better still, supply your own sources for the AI to draw on, rather than asking it to generate them.

3. Rewrite as needed to reflect your business purpose
AI produces a draft, not a finished piece. Read it aloud. Does it sound like you? Does it reflect your brand, your perspective, your specific expertise? If not, rewrite it until it does.

Revise the structure if it doesn’t serve your argument. Add relevant examples, stories, and case studies to enrich the text. You can even use the AI itself at this stage — give it feedback on the draft and ask it to incorporate your changes or ask it for critique. But the judgement about what’s right stays with you.

AI is a writing partner, not a ghostwriter

Using AI as your writing partner can introduce new angles, speed up the drafting process, and help you communicate more effectively. But used without care, AI can produce content that’s polished on the surface but dull and empty underneath. And more often than we’d like to think, readers can tell.

Writing well with AI requires genuine skill. It demands clear thinking, careful prompting, rigorous fact-checking, and the editorial judgement to know when something isn’t good enough yet.

AI can generate words indefinitely. Choosing what to keep and publish needs to remain with the human.

Join our Write Smarter with AI+Human workshop.