Impact of AI on enterprise, is it a gimmick or a high ride on the technology wave?

What is Artificial Intelligence

The whole world is reeling with this AI mantra and it is being resonated all over the place. As all of you know, there is nothing more mesmerizing, complex and brilliant as a human brain. Artificial intelligence gives the power and capability of a human brain to a machine. It helps in building smart machines that will emulate human intelligence. thereby making the job more efficient and quicker.

The impact of AI on companies happens at various levels. Broadly it can support three profound needs, first and foremost being automation of the processes. AI can also give insight through data analysis and help predict using the data set inputs. Finally, it can contribute to customer engagement and feedback and also give insight into the employee performances.

We move our attention now to companies that will provide AI support and applications. Nowadays, it has become very fancy and flashy to project oneself as an AI solution-oriented company or as an organization skilled in machine learning, AI and data science. Most of the time, when we look closely, we will realize that though they market themselves as AI specialists, there will not be any concrete applications, solutions or results to show the impact of bringing in AI. It has become a marketing gimmick as AI is in trend and to attract the attention of customers and enterprise, some companies include AI as part of their products. This does not reflect very well of the organization, nor is it any use to partner with companies providing false hopes and unrelated results.

What do enterprises and companies look for when they go hunting for AI solutions or AI companies to partner with? What will make your company look different when you project yourself as a unit which provides an AI solution. In the midst of all this gimmick what will make you stand out? Well, the answer is in the question itself. Why do we even look for solutions? We go looking for answers when we have problems. Yes, the problem statement is the most important aspect of a solution. When companies project themselves as an AI solution provider, they have to highlight the customer problem that they are going to solve. This problem must be a pain point for the customers or an enterprise with whom they are going to be associated.

When we look to sell our solutions, we should address the problem that we are handling at first. Once we express an understanding of the customer’s problem, you have gained their attention. The enterprise or customers now diverts his attention to you because you are displaying a complete awareness of the problem he is facing. He is now ready to listen to your solution to the problem. Once we present our solution to the problem, we also should discuss some preliminary results or a proof of concept so that the enterprise customer understands the impact your solution is making on the problem. Then the customer will come back with questions on the hows and whats of the solution. At this stage, if we explain that this was possible by the use of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, then we build a credible foundation for our product and its impact.

After their solution is presented and accepted by the customer, it becomes important for a company to explain and investigate how the solution is going to be scaling and how the quality is going to be tracked and maintained. Many a time, a solution is provided and implemented without keeping in mind the future directions or insights that may change the basis of the solution. AI is data-based and data keeps changing and therefore solutions that are going to be based on this data also require continuous improvement and scalability. There is no point in providing the solution and tweaking it every time a new condition or data is reflected. The very basis of using AI is, it is a smooth transition and it will change and adapt to changing data and environments with little human intervention. Care must be taken to accommodate the scalability, quality and ever-changing capabilities.

To summarise, when we market ourselves as an AI solution provider, we first need to touch a pain point problem of the customer and provide a solution to the same. We also need to produce results to reflect the effectiveness of our solution and prove its effectiveness by showing its adaptability to changes. We also need to present an effective solution for scalability and quality. A product that encompasses all these qualities into it will always become a successful product and the company marketing such a product will attract and engage many enterprises in the market.

References

Microsoft Ignite 2020