AI Isn’t a Strategy, But You Need and AI Strategy

Author: Krista LaRiviere, COO RTOWN Digital & CBH Agency Partners

As a business leader myself, I know how daunting it can be to try to wrap your brain around the next technology “trend” or “thing” - Cloud, IoT, Big Data, Blockchain, 3D Printing, Cybersecurity, just to name a few. In my opinion, Artificial Intelligence, and its current and potential impact on business is different. AI is a revolution. AI is the fourth revolution after Agricultural, Industrial, and Computational, and it is changing the way we do business forever.

When I ask small to mid-sized business leaders how AI makes them feel, the answers I receive include words such as: ‘overwhelmed’, ‘scared’, ‘fearful’, ‘anxious’, ‘angry’, and sometimes, ‘excited’. AI doesn’t have to be scary, but it does have to be embraced. Trust me when I say, I am scared for your business if you don’t embrace AI now.

This blog will provide you with 3 Must Do’s for the CEO + Leadership Team so your business isn’t left behind.

After one of my recent presentations titled, “Marketing in the Age of Intelligence” one of the CEOs in the room asked the best question, “I am buying into everything you are saying, but where do I start?”

My response, “Tomorrow morning go into the office (or jump on a Zoom) and gather your Leadership Team and start talking about AI. Ask them how they feel about it. Tell them how you feel about it. Have an open discussion about where the team sees opportunities for integrating AI into existing processes. Talk about potential risks. Talk.”

Ask them if they are already using AI to help achieve their day-to-day responsibilities. They likely are and you don’t even know it.

Ask them to do some reading and share their findings with the rest of the leadership team.

I recommend giving your team time to think. Ask to meet again in 24-48 hours and resume the open conversation.

Have a purpose. What is the business trying to achieve with AI? Quantify it. What is realistic given the resources at hand? How does it fit into your current 1 year and 3 year strategy, goals, and objectives? How do you phase it in?

One of my new favourite sayings is, ‘AI isn’t a strategy, but you need an AI strategy’. So get C-Suite commitment. Get excited. Get organized. Get the whole company on board.

As a leadership team, you are trying to avoid Random Acts of AI, AI off the side of the desk, and risk to the business.

You are talking and have commitment, great! Now hit the big green Go button!

Form in internal AI Committee or Council. Each functional area of the business should have a voice. Set goals and phases by department, ensure they are tied into the overall business goals and strategy, set the meeting cadence and have the AI Committee communicate regularly with the CEO + Leadership Team.

In terms of low-hanging fruit, the marketing and sales organizations currently stand to gain significantly by adopting AI processes and platforms so these teams will be busy focusing on their current day-to-day responsibilities and addressing AI, which is my next point.

Time is the one thing holding us back and truly gaining from the opportunities AI represents. After recently attending the MAICON in Cleveland, one of my biggest takeaways was this - the best approach to AI adoption without overwhelming your team is an organizational structure where an AI Operations role works alongside your department heads. The framework below includes a five-person marketing team. A one to 5+ marketing team would adopt the same framework.

Overburdening your team with the added responsibility of integrating AI into their processes will get the team nowhere fast. A marketers day is already busy enough. Instead, either hire an AI Operations Manager or an AI Agency to work with the AI Committee and CEO + Leadership team.

In closing, AI isn’t going away. This really is a flight or fight moment in the history of your business.

OpenAI looks in a five-level framework to track progress. It took 70 years for humans to get to Level #1 (Conversational AI/Chatbots). It took only 18 months to get to Level #2 (Human-Level Problem Solving/Reasoners). How long will it take for us to get to Level #3, #4, and #5?

Talk, Commit, Start.

Contact RTOWN today to learn about our AI Roadmap Consulting and AI Coaching services. We’re here to help!

[AI was not used in the creation of this blog.]