Last week we launched How We Write Now, a series about how writers are using AI, starting with Katie Parrott’s guide to Compound Writing—her framework for developing ideas, shaping drafts, and carrying what you learn into the next piece. This week, Laura Entis, who has been reckoning honestly with her own AI workflow, goes further: She interviewed five professional writers—including Every CEO Dan Shipper, designer Maggie Appleton, and New York Times alum Kevin Roose—about where they let AI in and where they draw the line. She found that there is no universal recipe: The same tool that helps one writer think more clearly makes another’s prose worse. Read on for five distinct, idiosyncratic workflows (including custom prompts) that make a case that writing with AI is a skill in its own right.—Kate Lee

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On deadline for a book about neurodiversity and work, journalist Alexandra Samuel fell victim to a condition all writers know and fear: writer’s block.

She had the research and a detailed outline. But there was always one more study to review, and so she put off writing anything. She booked a DIY writing retreat at a friend’s empty apartment, told herself she’d tackle a chapter a day—and turned to AI.

Each morning, she converted her research for that day’s chapter into a podcast, which she listened to as she scrambled eggs and made the first of many cups of coffee. The practice made sitting down to her computer feel more like continuing a conversation than staring at a blank page. When she hit a wall with drafting, she gave ChatGPT the day’s pages, closed her laptop, and had it interview her as she strolled through her friend’s neighborhood. The AI’s questions cut through her confusion. “After 40 minutes, my head was clear, and I knew where I was going,” she says.