Lower effort creation produces more output than teams can evaluate
Faster output should improve decisions, yet ChatGPT often degrades them. The tool increases the number of proposals without increasing the capacity to evaluate them. This imbalance leads to superficial judgment and worse outcomes.
Team prepares a budget proposal overnight
People believe that using ChatGPT to draft a full budget proposal overnight will accelerate decision-making in the next executive meeting. They expect that faster preparation will allow more time for review and lead to better-informed choices. They assume that the speed of generating the document translates directly into the speed and quality of the final decision.
Executives face more proposals in the same meeting slot
In practice, the team brings not one but three fully written budget proposals into the same fixed meeting slot. Executives now face more material without receiving more time to process it. They move quickly through each option, rely on surface clarity, and make a decision without fully examining assumptions or tradeoffs.
One mechanism drives the breakdown
ChatGPT reduces the effort required to produce complete proposals, which increases the number of proposals submitted. The evaluation capacity of executives remains fixed because meeting time and cognitive limits do not change. The increased number of proposals raises cognitive load, forcing executives to rely on superficial cues, such as clarity of language, rather than depth of reasoning. This shift replaces thorough evaluation with rapid pattern recognition.
Leaders misread speed as effectiveness
Leaders observe that more proposals get discussed per meeting and conclude that the team has become more productive. They interpret the smooth flow of well-written documents as a sign of strong preparation. They overlook that each decision receives less scrutiny, which leads to flawed budget allocations and later corrections. Performance appears to improve in the short term while hidden errors accumulate and require costly rework.
Bottom line
Faster generation increases proposal volume, and when evaluation capacity stays fixed, decision quality declines.
Note: We use the term “ChatGPT” as a shorthand for ChatGPT and similar tools such as Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, and custom GenAI chatbots.