Chapter 42 Capstone Exercises: Your Personal AI Mastery Plan

These exercises are the culmination of the work in this book. They move from self-assessment through planning to concrete commitment. Take your time with them — the quality of the plan you build here determines what happens next.

Part 1: The Self-Assessment

Exercise 1: The Six-Dimension Assessment

Complete the self-assessment in Chapter 42 honestly. Write your scores for all six dimensions:

For each dimension where you scored 3 or below, write two sentences: what specifically would a score of 4 look like for you in your professional context?

Exercise 2: The Skills Evidence Inventory

Your self-assessment scores should be grounded in evidence. For each dimension, list two to three specific examples from your AI use that justify your score:

Mental Models: Evidence that my trust calibration is at this level:

Prompting: Evidence that my prompting skill is at this level:

Platforms: Evidence that my platform knowledge is at this level:

Workflows: Evidence that my workflow integration is at this level:

Critical Thinking: Evidence that my verification and ethics practice is at this level:

Advanced Skills: Evidence that my advanced capabilities are at this level:

If you're struggling to find evidence for a score you assigned yourself, revise the score downward. The evidence is what makes the assessment honest.

Exercise 3: The Strength and Gap Summary

Based on your assessment:

Your top two strengths (highest-scoring, most evidence-rich):

Your two most important gaps (lowest score AND most important to your professional effectiveness):

The one thing that would most improve your AI practice if you developed it:

This answer to the third question is the anchor of your 30-day sprint.

Part 2: The Planning Worksheets

Exercise 4: The 30-Day Sprint Planner

Complete this planning sheet:

My most important gap to address:

My 30-day SMART goal: (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound)

The one habit I'm establishing: - What it is: - When I'll do it: - How long it takes: - How I'll track it:

My quick win (achievable this week):

What success looks like at day 30:

Exercise 5: The 90-Day Development Plan

Complete this planning sheet:

Primary skill investment:

90-day goal:

Specific activities (minimum 3): 1. 2. 3.

How I'll measure progress:

New capability to explore:

The capability:

Why this one:

How I'll evaluate it (what does "worth integrating" look like?):

Timeline:

Learning investment:

What:

Specific commitment (what, when, how often):

Exercise 6: The One-Year Vision

Write a 400-word description of your AI practice in one year. Make it vivid and specific:

• What does a typical Monday look like?
• What AI-assisted workflows are second nature?
• What have you built or configured?
• What does your prompt library contain?
• What is your role in relation to AI on your team?
• What can you do that you can't do today?

Then complete:

My one-year metrics (2-3 measurable indicators):

1. 2. 3.

My primary growth path (circle one): Practitioner / Builder / Leader / Expert

What progress on this path looks like at 12 months:

Part 3: The Growth Path Deep-Dive

Exercise 7: The Practitioner Path Worksheet

Complete only if Practitioner is your primary path.

Your professional domain and role:

The three most common tasks where AI could help but where you need to improve your approach:

1. 2. 3.

For each, write a specific prompt template that you'll refine and add to your library this quarter.

The quality dimension in your work where AI is most likely to reduce quality (based on your experience so far):

The specific workflow step you'll add to protect this quality dimension:

The practitioner in your domain whose AI practice you most want to learn from:

How you'll engage with their practice (follow their work, reach out, attend their presentation, etc.):

Exercise 8: The Builder Path Worksheet

Complete only if Builder is your primary path.

The workflow or task type most worth automating or API-integrating in your work:

The specific technical capability you'd need to build it (what you know, what you'd need to learn):

Your 90-day build goal (what will you have built or prototyped?):

The existing open-source project or community where you'd most benefit from engagement:

The non-technical collaborator who would most benefit from the tools you could build:

Exercise 9: The Leader Path Worksheet

Complete only if Leader is your primary path.

The team or organization whose AI adoption you're in a position to influence:

The most important AI policy gap in your organization right now:

Your 90-day policy/training/infrastructure goal:

The team member most resistant to AI adoption and your specific engagement strategy:

The measurement system you'll establish to track organizational AI adoption health:

Exercise 10: The Expert Path Worksheet

Complete only if Expert is your primary path.

The AI capability area you know least about but should understand better:

Your plan for developing that understanding (reading, testing, community engagement):

The domain adjacent to yours where AI is most advanced and what you can learn from it:

The specific AI failure mode you've observed most often and how you'd explain it to a non-practitioner:

The most important AI question in your professional field that nobody has answered well yet:

Part 4: The Three Commitments

Exercise 11: The Start/Stop/Improve Commitment

Write your three commitments — specific enough that you could report on them next week:

What I will START doing next week:

(Be specific: what, when, how often, how long)

What I will STOP doing (an AI habit that isn't serving me):

(Be specific: what AI use you're stopping or reducing, and what you'll do instead)

What I will IMPROVE (an existing element of my practice):

(Be specific: which prompt, workflow, or habit, and exactly how you'll improve it)

Sign and date this commitment if you want to take it seriously. A commitment that's written but unsigned is easily revised; one that's signed feels real.

Part 5: The Personal AI Mastery Plan (Complete Document)

Exercise 12: Build Your Full Plan

Synthesize the work from Exercises 4-11 into a single, readable planning document. Your complete Personal AI Mastery Plan should include:

Cover page: Your name, date, and primary growth path

Section 1: Where I Am Now - Six-dimension scores with brief evidence - Strengths and gaps summary - The one most important improvement

Section 2: The 30-Day Sprint - Goal - One habit - Quick win

Section 3: The 90-Day Plan - Primary skill investment and goal - New capability to explore - Learning investment

Section 4: The One-Year Vision - Written vision (400 words) - Three metrics - Growth path and what progress looks like

Section 5: The Three Commitments - Start - Stop - Improve

Section 6: Review Schedule - When you'll review this plan (monthly? quarterly?) - What you'll track - How you'll know if you're on track

Print this document. Put it somewhere you'll see it regularly. Review it at the 30-day mark.

Part 6: Reflection Questions

Exercise 13: The Full Journey Reflection

Looking back across all 42 chapters and whatever work you've done along the way, write responses to these reflection questions:

1. What's the single most important thing you've learned about working with AI that you didn't know when you started?

2. What's the most significant misconception you had about AI that has been corrected?

3. What aspect of your AI practice are you most proud of having developed?

4. What do you still find genuinely uncertain or difficult about working with AI?

5. What question about AI are you still holding open — not because you've avoided it but because you've genuinely engaged with it and it remains complex?

6. How has your professional identity shifted, if at all, in relation to AI?

Exercise 14: The Letter to a Colleague

Write a 500-word letter to a colleague who is just starting their AI adoption journey. Not a summary of this book — your advice, from your experience.

What would you tell them to start with? What mistakes would you encourage them to avoid? What were you surprised by? What's harder than you expected? What's better than you expected?

This letter serves two purposes: it synthesizes what you've learned by requiring you to articulate it clearly for someone else, and it may genuinely help a colleague.

Consider sending it.

Exercise 15: The 90-Day Check-In

Schedule a 60-minute appointment with yourself in 90 days, titled "Personal AI Mastery Plan — 90-Day Check-In."

At that appointment, review: - Did you complete your 30-day sprint goal? - Are you on track with your 90-day plan? - What have you learned that wasn't in the plan? - What adjustment does the plan need?

The check-in is where the plan becomes alive. Without it, the plan is just a document. With it, it's a practice.

Set the appointment now, before you put this book down.

Your practice begins now. Everything else was preparation.