Last week I spoke on a panel discussion hosted by Hacking HR during their AI Experience Summit. The topic was Measuring AI’s Impact on Business and Workplace Performance. Here are a few of the points I was able to make and few we didn’t have time for.
In terms of risk, the ability to safeguard proprietary information remains a top issue for those implementing any kind of AI in the enterprise. This is an area where outside expertise is probably helpful and one in which taking it slow makes sense. However, there are plenty of non-proprietary areas where AI can be helpful, from coaching apps to powerpoint deck writing assistants. Encourage your people to use them in ways which will not put company data at risk.
Make sure AI usage is something the entire company sees as a priority, not a centralized project. Have plans that span functions and communicate and celebrate wins in efficiency small and large. Use your company communications team to ensure the wins are communicated broadly. Encourage everyone to be willing to explain their AI hacks on your internal platforms. Review wins at the top leadership level.
Use efficiency gains to move work up the value added spectrum. On the panel I used the example of using our travel and event planning team to take on managing “surprise and delight” moments for the workforce at Purina, when their core work slowed down during the pandemic. Be sure to have similar plans across your functions – when time is unlocked, what will we do with it? If layoffs are your first answer, maybe you are doing this wrong.
While I always resisted additional mandatory training for all employees as a CHRO (every major function had something they wanted everyone to learn), on technology issues as large as the AI challenge, I am in favor of teaching the workforce the basics and making it mandatory. I had good success while CHRO with local partners, sometimes niche training firms, sometimes universities. Find one that works for your situation. Obviously a traditional manufacturer will have different needs than a technology firm.
While you are celebrating wins, be sure to find your Subject Matter Experts wherever they may be and leverage them as instructors. Your SME’s can be identified because they will be the ones that actually do something new with the technology.
Look for problems to solve that have previously been seen as unsolvable. One I think that is waiting for an AI application is a cafeteria style total rewards offering that allows employees to adjust their perqs and compensation components, managing the costs all together. For example could I take less of a 401K match and get some student loan pay off help? Can I go with a high deductible health care plan and a higher 401K match? Can I shift some of my annual bonus money into other areas and perqs? Up until now these have all been on different budgets making it difficult to do tradeoffs. Come on AI – prove to me how smart you are here. Once again, lots of proprietary cost info is buried in the detail….can it be done securely?
Media is all over the place on the advent of serious disruption by AI. Some CEO’s think we are 5 years away from serious job disruption, while some current articles claim there have only been minor gains in efficiency with AI. It is hard to make predictions, but we can agree that learning and preparing is incumbent on all of us.
We were asked on the panel to name one “big shift” we’d like to see. I said that I’d like to see the reporting on AI inside companies be all about what we can do now that we could not before, enabled by AI.
Sending my thanks to Hacking HR for the opportunity to chat on the panel with Sai Patel, Jeff Schwarz and Malvika Jethmalani. Good luck to those of you managing these new tools in your organizations!
