Ms. Alexis B. Bonnell, Chief Information Officer and Director of Digital Capabilities Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) was the luncheon speaker at the September Air & Space Forces Association, Wright-Memorial Chapter (212) (AFA) luncheon. Ms. Bonnell gave many a bracelet that she wears daily. It says, “Tackle The Toil” and “WIDTIW” (Would I Do This in War). These are mantras she thinks about for each initiative she works on as its the toil that kills purpose faster than anything else.

She said that industry must think about RAG when they bring in Artificial Intelligence (AI). Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) is a technique for enhancing the accuracy and reliability of generative AI models and facts fetched from external sources. RAG allows for individuals to have the knowledge they are looking for and have a relationship with the knowledge curated to the user’s interest. It brings in the data the user cares about. She said that Moms are the best prompt engineers because they can reword things several ways, i.e. “let me say that a different way so you can understand”.

Before each project, she conducts a “premortem exercise” and asks the team to define what success looks like and what will make them stop using it. She has no issue with stopping technology insertion projects if the success criteria are no longer present.

She stated there are 4 emotional stops on the technology evolution:
1. Ta-Da! At the first use of the technology when users are discovering what it can do.
2. Ut-Oh! When users discover what it means to them and/or the team and what they want the technology to bring out for them.
3. Ah-Ha! When the user understands why it’s important to them.
4. Ho-hum! During the maturation stage when the user is saturated with using it and wants more.

Thanks to Ms. Yvonne Vermillion for authoring this event overview!

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