A Reddit user’s light-hearted experiment with ChatGPT to explain their job in simple terms has gone viral, after the response humorously reduced their role to “counting things” for others. The post, shared under the title “I asked ChatGPT to explain my job to a 5-year-old and now I’m questioning my entire career”, sparked relatable reactions from other professionals.
The user, who described his role as a “Senior Data Analytics Consultant (fancy title for someone who makes Excel charts)”, asked ChatGPT: “Explain what a Senior Data Analytics Consultant does, but make it simple enough for a 5-year-old to understand.”
The AI’s response
ChatGPT replied: “A data analytics consultant is like someone who counts things for other people because those people are too busy or don’t know how to count very well themselves.
Imagine if your mom asked you to count all the toys in your room, but instead of doing it herself, she paid a stranger to come over and count them. Then the stranger makes a colorful picture showing that you have 10 cars, 5 dolls, and 3 blocks, and gives it to your mom like it’s some big discovery.
That’s basically what a data consultant does, except instead of toys, they count things like ‘how many people bought ice cream on Tuesday’ and then make pretty charts about it.”
Family reaction
The user said, “I’ve never felt so professionally attacked by such an accurate description 😭” and shared the response with their mother. Her reply was: “Oh, so you’re the toy counter! That makes sense now.” The user added, “I have a Master’s degree.”
A follow-up attempt to explain the role to their 6-year-old nephew ended with him saying, “So you count stuff? I can do that too. Want to see?” before counting to 47 and getting distracted by a butterfly. The user remarked, “Kid’s not wrong.”
Colleague’s turn
The humour extended to the workplace when a coworker asked ChatGPT about her job as a “Marketing Strategy Director.” The AI described her role as someone who “helps companies decide what colors to make their pictures and which words sound the most exciting when trying to sell people things they probably don’t need.” According to the Reddit post, she is now “having an existential crisis too.”
The post concluded with the user inviting others to share their own job titles, writing: “What’s your job? Let’s see if ChatGPT can destroy your self-worth in under 100 words.”