Keeping it human in the age of AI

In 2024, artificial intelligence seems to be the topic on everyone’s minds. This life-changing, money-saving technology has taken over our personal and professional lives. However, without proper knowledge, AI can lead your company into financial, security, and legal risks. Amidst this technological revolution, a crucial question surfaces; how do we, as humans, maintain our essence in the face of AI’s influence?

If generative AI is writing for you, it is writing for your competitors

While generative artificial intelligence may be considered a time-saver, it poses many challenges. First, when AI writes for you, it utilizes information relevant to your prompt fed previously to the tool. This means there is a limited knowledge base the tool is pulling from (until new information is input by users like you). The piece of content produced will not contain information on the originating source. Meaning, you will need to become a plagiarism fact checker for a computer program to prevent your company from a potential intellectual property theft lawsuit.

Our advice? Write the content yourself. Use AI as an editor (within reason! Even AI can be grammatically incorrect occasionally. We advise you to seek another person if you need another pair of eyes.) to enhance your copy and gather ideas.

AI tools also pose security risks to your company. Any information put into an AI can’t be unlearned by the AI. Inputting confidential information can leave your company at risk. While many tools allow you to adjust the settings so that you do not contribute to the AI’s training, these settings are not foolproof.

Customers are calling for you, not a robot

There’s nothing quite like a pet peeve, and if you’ve asked your customers to answer several specifying questions from a voice recording, you may have just annoyed many. Not-so-shockingly, 70% of consumers would rather speak to a person than have an automated interaction. A brainstorming question for your team: Is there a way to make your automated phone interactions more personable?

When in doubt, analyze what your competitors are doing and see what you can do to stand out. Do they force their customers to interact with AI before directing them to a department? It can be frustrating when the automated service can’t answer a customer’s question and there isn’t a team member dedicated to answering non-traditional questions, just a preset menu of options. Creating an easy-to-navigate system to speak to a representative may be the best option; otherwise, you could lose customers.

Our advice? Monitor your customer service, improve what you can, and most importantly, see how you can provide service better than the company across the street.

Professional interactions should still be personal

With busy daily schedules, it can be challenging to gather a department or even an entire company for face-to-face interaction. Managers rely heavily on e-mail and instant messaging to ensure their team is up to speed. Emails, text messages, everything digital can be done by AI, which is a good thing up to a point. As younger generations progress in their careers, they are more comfortable with this environment and often replace in-person interaction with technology more so than their older peers. It’s a slippery slope for individualism, so the manager must act purposefully.

1. Meetings - We understand time is a limited resource, but this is an important asset to your department. In-person or online are both fine (especially if working in a hybrid or remote environment), but keep everyone on the same page and as a team. AI is a great resource when scheduling these meetings while still being in contact with your department!
2. Get to know your team - This sounds silly, but you would be surprised how many managers don’t know anything about who they hired. What do they do in their free time? What music do they listen to? Asking these questions with intention goes a long way toward making your team feel valued. Taking it back to business, automated (anonymous) surveys are an efficient AI tool to gauge how your team feels in their role and your company.
3. Create a “fun” environment – You may have heard about the phrase “All work and no play.” If you haven’t, spoiler (and changing to fit the narrative): It makes for a dull day. And in the age of AI, soft skills are more important than ever before. Set aside time for team-building activities, even free ideas that can be downloaded online. Start a book club, monthly happy hour, or friendly competition to incentivize sales. AI sales trackers and scheduling assistants provide the help you need to get everyone together face-to-face.

Experts never intended AI to control the narrative but to create an interdependency. As professionals, it’s important to work with technology instead of seeing it as a project manager. The ability to write an article is an amazing feat of technology, but it can leave you liable for intellectual property theft. AI can also be a cost-effective approach with clients and employees but can also cause frustration. Each company must know about AI benefits, repercussions, and trends for the coming years. This is the best way to create a competitive edge, drive profits, and keep your company moving forward.