How real is Artificial Intelligence for you?

20 June 2024

Can you see, feel, hear the difference Artificial Intelligence (AI) is making in your organisation? Does it feel real i.e. is it making a difference?

There’s been much hype around AI and what it means. Every day something new seems to be happening as the pace picks up around the technology and the subtleties that go along with Artificial Intelligence.

So how real is Artificial Intelligence for you and for your organisation?

Firstly, to understand where you and your organisation are in the adoption of AI, let’s get to basics - what is AI?

There are many variants of definitions out there, for us at the Human Digital Collaborative, Artificial Intelligence put simply is about computers and digital devices answering an ask or solving a problem you may have by drawing their answer from a large data source. In essence, the artificial intelligence looks up menus in its library to determine quick answers for you. There are other variants of AI e.g. such as Artificial General intelligence (more human-like, sentient) which with the advent of applications Chat GPT and Claude. AI is now multi-modal i.e. text, pictures, audio, video and code can be generated from multiple inputs. This broadens the use and capabilities of AI.

Do you understand why, or how AI is being used? Or if you are currently using AI, what is it being used for and how could you use it better in the future?

Understanding where you are as an organisation in the AI adoption cycle can be tricky depending on the size and scale of your organisation and the technology you deploy.

The Why

Firstly, understanding why you have or want to deploy Artificial Intelligence may seem like stating the obvious but taking time to do this properly can reap rewards for you both in terms of quality, time and money.

Taking each area of your business and understanding if there’s a need to deploy artificial intelligence in pockets or on a larger scale is a good starting point. Is it fixing a problem or challenge? Can AI help release benefits such as much needed resource to do work elsewhere or can it speed up your processing time? For example, speeding up how you process information can save many hours in human effort and administrative paper work for your business.

You may already have AI in your business - dependent on the scale and complexity of your organisation ask yourself – do you know if its proving useful or being deployed beneficially? Is it worth it – is it giving you the returns or results you need?

The How and the What?

Once you know you need or discover you have the AI technology, self-questioning exactly how and what you want to deploy it is important. Many organisations have tackled the ‘how’ by rolling it out in key functions such as in the finance department e.g. speeding up payroll processing or in human resources, helping with recruitment.

Some organisations also look at cross-business needs via value chain analysis to determine the ‘hotspots’ to deploy AI.

What you then deploy as a business is very much dependent on the problem at hand for example Chatbots are popular as customer facing deployments particularly in the Retail and Service sectors.

It’s good to have an ‘Artificial Intelligence’ Healthcheck to determine if you are ready or are using the technology in the best way. Getting the right infrastructure and platforms in place is one of the steps to consider. Another is what information is held in your business. Often data abounds in organisations, but it’s gaining the best insights to take speedy informed decisions which is important to many organisations for how they learn and grow. Indeed, training and learning need to fit with the AI take-up and improvements, so that human intervention and collaboration is always employed when needed.

At the Human Digital Collaborative, we can work with you to determine the best means of deployment and or extension/improvement to what artificial intelligence you need.

As I finish writing this article, I know something new will have happened somewhere around the globe to advance AI capabilities. It is a technology which is moving fast at the moment, whether it will slow in both development and adoption in the future is hard to predict, because at the moment the pace of change seems ever-quicker.

For us at the Human Digital Collaborative, we have a number of years’ experience in developing and deploying AI solutions, and we’re excited and determined to find ways to make technology work positively for humans. So do watch this space as we provide updates on innovation and forward-thinking on how we can help you and your business.

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Transformation twists and turns? For anyone who has undertaken a transformation programme particularly a significant, complex, multi-faceted transformation you will know that there are many twists and turns to ensuring success, particularly if the journey is taken over a number of years. Key to good transformation planning is making sure you have the support of your stakeholders, the right people in place, and the right resources to make it happen whether that be for example budget or systems, they all need to work in harmony to keep the transformation alive and help pave your way to success. Holding regular reviews is also important i.e. looking back and looking forward, looking inward, as well as outward to make sure you are still on the right path, and you keep pace with the times. A good illustration of why transformation is important is by looking at a case of a well-known company who enjoyed many years of success, but then failed to transform quick enough with challenging consequences: Kodak. Eastman Kodak (commonly know as Kodak) was incorporated as a business in 1832, and it grew to be one of the leading manufacturers of film and cameras in the world. However, it failed to recognise the significant threat of other competitors particularly in its market’s-movement to digital. This is despite one of its own employees in 1975 developing the world’s first hand-held digital camera, and another employee four years later predicting that a shift to digital photography was inevitable. Kodak executives seemingly ignored the warning signs, the advice given, and sadly it started its transformation journey too late, as over a century later since it began, this once successful company had to file in 2012 for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection [1] in the United States. A massive decline for a brand and a business who at one time seemed untouchable in its market. A huge price to pay for taking time to transform. The story for Kodak however, is not all bleak, as Kodak can be applauded for its tenacity to stay in business. By 2016 it once again started to generate a profit by transforming and restructuring its business. There are many other business illustrations of failing to transform that I could cite, however Kodak is a memorable example of a business whose longevity unfortunately did not give it licence to move to transform at a slower pace. A number of key questions arise from this case study and perhaps take stock of your own organisation’s transformation journey: Would Kodak be more of a dominant brand for consumers nowadays if it had transformed its business earlier? If it had shifted its consumer film products and services earlier to digital? (it still has a film business with movies). Or if it had looked inward, recognising talent, and listening to employees in its own organisation? Or if it had looked outward and reacted faster to the competitor threats from Fujifilm or indeed the smartphone and device manufacturers? How the picture (pardon the pun!) may have been different today if such a dominant company with a very strong brand, had fine-tuned the twists and turns of transformation to its advantage? Transformation timing? We hear often from businesses – now is not a good time to transform, or we tried that, and it didn’t work, or those types of change (e.g. front or back- office administration process automation) works in that business sector but wouldn’t work in ours? Ask yourself are these just excuses for not taking bold steps to transform or are there genuine reasons for standing still in your organisation? The key question is can you really afford for your organisation to stand still? As a former CEO we know always said after implementing a successful transformation, ‘there’s more to do.’ In other words, his success was not going to be pinned to the mast of completing the last journey to improvement, but rather looking across the organisation to see how things could be improved further for its customers, its staff and its stakeholders.