Are Enterprises Taking the Easy Way Out with Generative AI?

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The Big Idea: Are enterprises taking the easy way out with Gen AI?

The latest numbers from Deloitte show that most organizations are primarily relying on off-the-shelf generative AI solutions.

Seventy-one percent of productivity applications, for instance, come from off-the-shelf products like Microsoft’s suite of copilots. That’s low-hanging fruit, and there’s nothing wrong with taking that approach. But it has limited ROI.

As May Habib, the CEO of Writer, put it on LinkedIn: “The most impactful generative AI use cases in your company have to do with SHARED workflows and insights around UNSTRUCTURED DATA. CoPilot is about team access to STRUCTURED data, and productivity on PERSONAL unstructured data. Based on what we've seen, you don't get transformational business impact from individuals using generative AI on their personal unstructured data.”

We asked Don Brumfield, Build Mode Editorial Board member and former VP of Global IT at Heidrick & Struggles, for his take. He said it depends on what your firm is trying to accomplish. If you are trying to focus on productivity and elevating customer experience—which is a great place for many firms to start—then off-the-self is totally fine. It provides a quick win environment by leveraging someone else's R&D costs and allows you to remain flexible from a cost standpoint.

So when does it make sense to "build your own" when it comes to AI? And, given that productivity increases alone won’t be transformational, where can orgs find the real ROI of AI?

We assembled a panel of CFOs last week and the CFO at Hungryroot, Wajeeha Ahmed, explained how their custom generative AI solution helps personalize healthy food selections for customers on their online grocery and delivery platform.

“There is a very direct business result when you personalize better,” Ahmed said.

CHART OF THE WEEK

This is where CEOs expect to see ROI from AI

Sixty-four percent of CEOs expect at least a 5% increases in efficiency from their employees as they implement Generative AI, according to a new CEO survey from PwC.

That feels like an understatement.

It would have been interesting if they had included an option for 10% or 20%. According to our own forthcoming research the productivity gains are much higher, at least among highly-skilled product builders.

Then again, with bigger companies there’s typically an uphill climb in terms of change management when doing large scale digital transformation.

The fact that 41% of CEOs expect at least a 5% increase in revenue in the next 12 months is exciting. It suggest that the rubber is beginning to meet the road with all these AI initiatives.

WATERCOOLER

Can chatbots convince climate deniers to change their minds?

Nature published a report in which researchers had users of different ideological persuasions and background chat to GPT3. They found specifically that climate deniers and those skeptical of the BLM movement reported dissatisfaction with the AI Chatbot and an unlikeliness to use it again... however they also expressed attitudinal changes towards being less skeptical of climate change or BLM.

Dan Balsam, head of AI at RippleMatch and Build Mode Editorial Board Member, explained it like this: We don't pay enough attention to how AI chatbots could be a tool for pro-sociality of various kinds. Chatbots which get people to expand their thinking and challenge their own deeply held beliefs seems like a very positive potential for the tools.

There's an opportunity for a new generation of products to design themselves in ways that encourage and reward this behavior—where we've been in a state of epistemic decay due to the incentive structure of social media.

The best version of AI will challenge beliefs on both sides of the aisle. Ultimately I'd like to see a human species that is more interested in the pursuit of truth, even when it contradicts what feels good to believe. All human beings would benefit from an interlocutor who made them strengthen the evidence behind their own beliefs more deeply—it's the only way we've ever moved forward.

EVENTS

AI Leaders Roundtable: Build vs. Buy

When does it make sense to "build your own" when it comes to AI?

Join us tomorrow for an insightful discussion with Allie Meng, Director of Product at Newmark. Allie will share her experiences in leveraging Generative AI to drive efficiencies in a traditionally structured industry, shedding light on the practical applications of this transformative technology.

Sign up here.

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