Get Useful Answers from AILesson 4 of 5
Checking an AI answer before you trust it
~5 min read
An AI answer that sounds confident is not the same as an AI answer that's correct. This lesson is a short checklist to run before you act on anything an AI gives you for real work.
The rule of thumb: the more consequential the output — money, a client relationship, a legal or medical claim — the more independent verification it needs before you rely on it. AI is a fast first draft, not a substitute for judgment.
Checklist
- 1Numbers and dates: can you verify this specific figure from a source you trust — a document, a website, your own records? If not, treat it as a guess, not a fact.
- 2Names and claims about people or companies: would you be comfortable if this turned out to be wrong and someone asked "where did you get that"? If not, verify before using it.
- 3Anything you're about to send externally: read it once as if you were the recipient. Does it sound like something a careful person actually wrote?
- 4If the AI cites a source, check whether that source is real and says what the AI claims it says — AI tools sometimes invent plausible-looking sources.
Try this task
Take the last AI answer you used for real work. Run it through the checklist above. Would it have changed anything?
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