The Terminator, Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey – These are just a few cinematic examples of the implementation of AI in an ever-growing, ever-changing society. Though at this point in time we don’t have a MTHR-like computer from Ridley Scott’s 1979 Alien, nor do we have any Synths or Androids just yet, AI has made its steppingstones into our bustling world in the past 10-15 years. Although this can be a new challenge for business owners, it may also be welcome help. For many small to large business owners, something to strive for is rewarding customer satisfaction and productivity, and newly introduced AI is helping business owners expedite growth and progress at a rapid rate.
How, exactly, can business owners utilize AI in a proficient way that doesn’t overshadow human productivity and allow for fluid give-and-take from Business Owner to Consumer? It’s simpler than one may think. One crucial area that AI is very useful in is IT, where workers use AI to augment coding abilities, while not wasting too much time into writing the outline of their codes. Business admins also benefit greatly, as they do a lot of office tasks and generate documents for their superiors. Data entry admins may find AI tools useful in formatting similar date structures again, eliminating time spent repeating things like dates, numbers, names, etc. AI helps with troubleshooting too, which also in tandem helps IT employees by helping with things like mail merging without getting IT involved. Summarization is also helpful for nearly any department, allowing for quick summaries that get the point across without spending an excess amount of time reading and re-reading.
Brainstorming is also helped with AI, as AI can pull from similar flows and streams of thought from around the internet and accessible data, so structure and planning can be better executed when utilizing AI tech. Customer satisfaction and service can also become more efficient by providing things like AI chatbots that help customers via websites. Driving AI tools can also make a customer’s experience easier and smoother with guidance and suggestions. It can help with decision making, offering insights to help businesses make better decisions about things like inventory, marketing, sales, and more.
Surely, with so many great tools, AI seems like the perfect thing to incorporate within a company, but there’s a lot of arguments against AI’s place in the workforce, too. Recently, in an article by The New York Times, job interviews are beginning to be conducted via AI, meaning faceless, AI voiced interviewers over a computer call. There’s a reason why applicants are hesitant to apply given that they are unable to even speak to a human being—but a robot. The importance of human interaction in the workforce is crucial, and in businesses a large complaint comes from companies beginning to use AI bots instead of people to handle customer issues and complaints. This often leads to frustrated consumers, especially when it can be something crucial that they are trying to reach a human representative over. Companies like Door dash and UberEATS almost exclusively use AI bots for customer issues, leading to angry consumers whose issues have not been resolved, or are resolved poorly. Or pharmacies like Walgreens who make you jump through hoops to speak to a representative, often speaking to an AI voice that struggles to detect human speech correctly. This can result in mistakes of where the customer is supposed to be transferred to, or which department. AI can also present wrong information, so it’s important to double-check sources and remember that keywords often determine an AI’s response. It’s why most doctors tell you “Don’t google your symptoms!” – After all, you could search something as simple as a tickle in your throat and AI will present you with options from sore throat to anaphylaxis. It’s important to make crucial decisions and decide what parts of AI seem useful and beneficial while not ignoring the negatives. AI does have its errors, as do humans, but it’s statistically less likely to have as many mistakes, as it’s trained with an algorithm.
A good example of a great use of AI, especially for small businesses, by assisting during Tax Season go. Doing taxes is never fun, nor is it easy to do by oneself, but with AI resources, according to Karla Dennis, CEO and Founder of KDA Inc, businesses are “…Able to streamline tax preparation by categorizing transactions and identifying deductions, making it easier for businesses to stay organized.” According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AI tools can help with providing current info to businesses about tax regulations and compliance, while also helping with analyzing lots of data that are time consuming otherwise. AI Tax Prep software is a neat and useful tool for small business owners, and they should take advantage of it–while acknowledging that, as previously stated, AI can make mistakes. As a business owner, the discernment of AI ultimately comes down to what you would like improved and exemplified in your workplace and in your company. AI also is not an end-all be-all for removing human minds entirely from the workplace, and if Sci-Fi horror has taught us anything, we shouldn’t 100% rely on AI to replace human minds (I’m looking at you, 2001…even thinking about HAL gives me shivers…). AI should rather be a tool that human employees use to help smooth the ebb and flow of the workplace, providing useful tools and devices to help everyone from admins to CEOs. With proper usage, AI can be the best friend to a business owner and their employees, allowing for new ideas, increased productivity, and opening a world of new knowledge to apply to the inner and outer workings of a successful business.
Very insightful and well said! Interested to see where AI takes us in another 10-15 years!