3 Steps To Successfully Implement Artificial Intelligence At Your Startup

Artificial Intelligence (AI) could increase global GDP by 14 percent, or an astounding $15.7 trillion by 2030. This is due, in large part, to productivity gains from AI automation and workforce augmentation.

AI will change the world, but it takes time to implement and train it. It’s important for your business to understand how, when, and where to implement Artificial Intelligence, and it’s often best to start small. The world at large is still learning how best AI can be used to benefit society. For businesses, investments in AI made over time can snowball into big returns.

If you’re ready to get started implementing AI in your business, here are three steps to ensure you’re on the right path:

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1. The Right People in the Right Seats

When starting out on any new project, it’s critical to fill your bus with the right people in the right seats. People, not robots. Researchers have many hurdles to overcome before Artificial Intelligence is capable of replacing humans in every role.
 Luckily for us, the possibility of AI domination is still far off.

Gary Kasparov, a chess grandmaster, was beaten by IBM’s Deep Blue AI in 1997. Today, chess AI is beatable by “centaurs”, or teams made up of humans and AI. The successful businesses of the future will have teams consisting of both humans and AI working together in tandem. With this future in mind, we need to prepare our workforce to handle their role in an AI-first world.

To start on your business’s AI journey, you’ll need product managers who can identify a business problem for AI to solve, as well as data engineers who can integrate your technology systems into a properly structured database and data warehouse. And you’ll need analysts who can work with the data the AI collects, and help train the AI to make ever better decisions.

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2. Re-Skill your Staff

Committing to an AI future at your company doesn’t mean replacing your teams with machines or new people. You can and should re-skill your existing employees, helping them become more comfortable with — and eventually proficient at — working with AI systems.

As a small business leader, you may not have the capacity to assess the AI readiness of your entire staff. But you can encourage AI education in the form of workshops, online training sessions, or part-time degree programs.

Resources to learn about AI are abundant and growing. As an example, Andrew Ng, a former AI leader at Google, is launching an “AI for Everyone” online training course through Stanford University. The program, which will be available on Coursera, aims to provide an introduction to machine learning and statistical pattern recognition for business people.

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3. Have a Defined Scope & Demonstrate Value Daily

It’s important to show your team members what AI can do for them. One area where AI shines is automating time sink task, like data entry,  that eat up hours and reduces productivity. As we discussed in our blog post, 5 Biggest Customer Success Challenges,  a number of these pain points can be addressed using AI.   Reducing pain points via automation is a good way to generate team buy-in. Let AI take care of the tedious tasks so your people can spend their time on more fulfilling work.

Define the scope of what tasks AI can handle so your team can clearly understand how their time can be better valued. Track the time saved on tedious tasks to clearly demonstrate AI efficiencies. Let your people focus on what inspires them and creates real value for your business.

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Use Cases

AI efforts do not have to be overly complicated. Here are a few Use Cases that demonstrate how we’ve seen AI make huge impacts within organizations.  We invite you to download these Use Cases to take a deeper dive:

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Project Management

Automate repetitive tasks such as scheduling, resource allocation and reporting. Use past data and risk estimation to develop more realistic project timelines and improved delivery success metrics. Provide 24/7 training modules to improve the on-boarding process, enhance skills and reduce costs.

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Transportation

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Optimize routing, timing, and asset management utilizing customer preferences and travel data. Address FAQs with 24/7 response, and reduce time spent on support tickets.

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‍HR Processes

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Automate repetitive tasks during employee feedback loops and self-assessment/review processes. Streamline and upgrade hiring processes and use data to eliminate stereotypes. Provide 24/7 access to FAQs and employee training modules.

By taking steps to build an AI-proficient team, re-skill your current team members, and communicate AI’s purpose, you can join a growing number of companies that are innovating into the future.
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We invite you to meet Hoover, our Intelligent Assistant and schedule a demo today to learn more about swivl, our human-in-the-loop AI customer success solution, and how AI can empower your team and your business.

Scale your Customer Success with Artificial Intelligence.