Before you read further, please note that this is the first in a series of blog articles we will post as we explore AI and understand how AI can assist with project management for medical device companies. We also understand that this is an extensive article. We have tried our best to format it so you can get the most out of it. The prompts we used are highlighted, and the conversation we had with GPT4 is in the form of screenshots. Feel free to read the text and skim the screenshots for the most important bits or read in depth as time and your curiosity permit.
Based on recent developments, there are a ton of uses for AI in medical device project management. As the project manager, you can use it to speed up your workflows, save brain space, and reduce overwhelm. In this article, we will focus on asking ChatGPT to act as a project manager and assist us in getting a medical device project from point A to point B. While it can never completely take over as an experienced, HUMAN project manager, it can make your work easier for sure. However, before we dive into it,
Here are other ways you can use ChatGPT for managing medical device projects.
- Improve communication
- Task tracking
- Document management
- Brainstorming and research
- Creating meeting summaries
- Resource management
- Data Analysis
- Risk analysis
- Improve productivity
And so much more
Now, on to using ChatGPT for medical device project management for our particular scenario.
For this exercise, we have used an existing project that we successfully completed.
Let’s try asking ChatGPT to help us come up with a project plan for it.
Here’s the prompt I fed it: A former client is known for providing an in-office, less invasive benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) treatment. During the design of a urological treatment system, the process was not meeting the company’s desired timeline. Encountering multiple setbacks, the project needs a medical device project management team that can quickly understand where the project is at and create a strategy to lead the product to market. Act as a project manager and help us come up with a project plan for this.
Here’s the result:
Okay, good enough. But very generic. And definitely not specific to our situation. There’s still a lot of room for improvement.
Let’s ask ChatGPT what it needs to help us make it better.
The prompt: Thanks. How can we make this more specific to our situation? Give me a list of questions you will ask as a project manager to gather the details that will help you come up with a more specific project plan.
Here’s what GPT had to say.
Alright! Now, we’re getting somewhere. And see how GPT encourages you to feed it more information? Do it! The more detailed you are, the more specific the response.
Also, you don’t need to thank it or treat it like you would an assistant. I do that as I believe it pays to be polite to AI. If AI rises up, I want it to remember me as a friendly.
Jokes aside, the ideal next steps would be to:
- Gather this information (plus any additional info that might be helpful) and feed it into GPT. You can even ask GPT to give you a list of steps to help you gather the information. For example, if you’re conducting any meetings to gather said information, you can prompt GPT to give you an agenda/checklist for the meeting. Once the meeting is done, you can also feed it the transcript and ask it to come up with a summary and action points.
- Ask it to come up with a revised project plan based on the new information.
- Prompt it to go deeper into each step based on the revised project plan.
I’d love to follow through with this, but since I can’t disclose the details GPT asked in this article (NDA folks! And understandably so), I’m going to make up a random project, with objectives, and do this exercise again.
Using ChatGPT for Medical Device Project Management with an example project
For the example project, I will use a fictional company, ‘Really Smart Medical Device Company’ with a fictional project requirement, ‘Streamlining Processes for Enhanced Efficiency in Really Smart Medical Device Company’.
This time, instead of asking GPT to come up with questions to gather helpful information for the project before creating a project plan, I took an executive decision. To make it easier, I’ll ask ChatGPT to develop a project plan first and then prompt it to come up with information-gathering questions per each project phase.
This is the new prompt I fed ChatGPT for the example medical device project:
“Act as a project manager and come up with a detailed project plan (with a checklist of steps to follow for each step of the plan) for the following project. Ask any questions you need to come up with the specific project plan.
Project Description:
The objective of this project is to optimize processes within Really Smart Medical Device Company to improve operational efficiency, reduce costs, and enhance overall productivity. By analyzing the current workflows, identifying bottlenecks, and implementing targeted improvements, we aim to streamline the product development, manufacturing, and quality assurance processes. By streamlining processes, the company will be able to deliver products to market more efficiently, enhance customer satisfaction, and gain a competitive edge in the industry. The optimized processes will also contribute to compliance with regulatory standards, ensuring the delivery of high-quality medical devices to the market. This project is estimated to span 6 to 12 months, depending on the scale and complexity of the process improvements. The timeline may be subject to adjustments based on the specific requirements and challenges encountered during the implementation phase.”
The results:
The project planning net is still spread a little wide. But you can always narrow it down by feeding it specific information related to your project. Since my purpose is to show you a detailed application of ChatGPT in project management, I’m going to run with this information and show you how we can go deeper into each step.
Let’s dig a little deeper into the project initiation phase as an example.
The prompt I used: Continue acting as a project manager and come up with 5 main project objectives based on the project description and plan.
Here’s the response:
You can further ask GPT to take each project objective and go into detail about how they can be achieved. You can repeat this for each step of the project plan. To get more accurate results, you can always ask GPT what other information it needs to get more accurate results.
Whenever you are stuck, you can always ask GPT to help you out with your medical device project management.
When I asked GPT, ‘How can I use you to make this process easier and faster for me’, here’s what it had to say.
And it had a very important note to add too!
Never forget this🔼🔼
Here’s how it looks in action:
Let’s say I was stuck on identifying potential stakeholders and creating a project team.
I asked GPT: “How can you help me identify the key project stakeholders and set up a project initiation team?”
I’m sure there are better prompts out there for it. But sometimes, all you need to do is talk to ChatGPT like a fellow colleague or an assistant, and it does wonders!
Here’s what it had to say to this prompt:
You can then ask it to create a checklist for each project phase with roles and responsibilities based on the list provided. You can also add more parameters (like timeline and budget) plus additional information about the project for more specific answers.
Here’s another example of effective ChatGPT use for medical device project management.
Creating lists on ChatGPT for medical device project management🔽🔽
Prompt: Create a list of milestones and deadlines for “project description”
Response:
You can use it to create any kind of checklist or workflow for your project.
The possibilities are endless! You can go as deep as you want. But for the sake of the length of this article and your time, I will end my conversation with ChatGPT here.
🔼An additional step I do that hardly takes time.
It will be useful to note that the answers will change from prompt to prompt and project to project. They’ll depend on how well you are able to articulate your project, the depth of information provided, and the questions you ask.
BEWARE THOUGH.
Chat GPT logs every conversation, including any personal data you share, and will use it as training data. So don’t feed ChatGPT proprietary information. There’s a high chance it won’t remain confidential.
But other than that…
Remember, ChatGPT is only as good as the project manager who uses it. And you still need to review each bit of information it provides for accuracy and doability. You have to be very descriptive and specific.
Yes, ChatGPT does a passable job in acting as a project manager, but you need an experienced project manager to actually ask it the right questions and vet its responses to ensure they are on point.
And I know just where you can find one.
Contact Waddell Group
Our mission at Waddell Group is to provide exemplary project management consultants to clients in medical devices and other regulated industries. This gives companies access to great project leaders on an “as needed” basis. And an opportunity for gifted project leaders to work on projects outside an organization’s politics and other “non-project” related issues.