Most of today’s leaders consider their success dependent on strategies using artificial intelligence (AI) as tools to help them find and use insights that improve decisions and outcomes.
Of the 2,620 global business leaders surveyed by the Deloitte AI Institute in 2022, 94% said they consider AI to be critical to the success of their organizations in the next five years. And 79% report full deployment for three or more types of AI applications: a dramatic increase to 62% in 2021.
But many organizations find that their results fall short of their ambitions. Developing and deploying AI technology and practices alone is not enough to unlock its full potential.
The Deloitte AI Institute State of AI in the Enterprise report 5th Edition classified only 27% of surveyed organizations as AI “transformers” who have achieved strong results from AI innovation. Almost as many organizations, 22%, are AI “underachievers” who are focused on developing AI without using it effectively.
The main challenges for startups include proving the business value of AI, lack of executive commitment, and the need to choose the right tools. Additional challenges to scaling AI projects include insufficient funding or technical expertise to implement them.
Fortunately, underachievers can become transformers and tap the hidden opportunities of AI by taking four concrete actions:
- investment in culture and leadership, to support new ways of working;
- transforming operations, to support ethical AI at scale;
- orchestrating technology and talent, to unleash greater human potential; and
- select use cases that accelerate value across different operations and sectors.
Supporting New Ways of Working
A culture that supports AI is essential to change. Two out of five survey respondents said agility, acceptance of change, and an executive vision for the use of AI are the main factors in creating an AI-forward culture.
Those leaders who promote cross-organizational collaboration, actively nurture and retain AI professionals, and tap into growing workforce optimism for AI opportunities may find stronger result of their efforts.
While most of the labor force previously viewed AI with suspicion, 82% of survey respondents said that today’s workforce believes that AI can help improve their performance and satisfaction as a collaboration tool to help people who can make better decisions.
To build trust in AI’s abilities to empower employees, leaders need to involve business specialists and frontline employees in designing their AI, as the global retailer did that H&M by engaging merchandisers to test and develop a sales pricing algorithm—boosting business and employee results. good will to AI.
Implementing Ethical AI at Scale
Reaping the full rewards of AI requires redesigning operations to accommodate it and using it ethically by establishing clear processes and redefining roles. around AI.
Only one-third of the most recent survey respondents said their organizations have adopted best practices for redesigning their workflows for AI. For organizations trying to accelerate AI, ethics presents a real obstacle: half of the survey respondents consider the management of AI-related risks to be a major barrier to scaling. in AI projects.
To adopt a transformational AI strategy, organizations must take steps such as following documented machine learning operations (MLOps) procedures, using documented processes for data management and quality, using common and consistent platforms for AI modeling and application development, and using risk-management processes to check AI for bias and other risks.
A financial services company, facing challenges such as poor customer service and regulatory and compliance violations, paired AI management and risk management specialists with its data scientists to build an ethical AI framework for managing its adoption responsibly, with better governance and control, and greater worker awareness and accountability for AI’s abilities and limitations.
Unleashing Great Human Capabilities
Organizations need to strategize by pairing AI and human capabilities—and skilled AI talent has long been in short supply.
As AI advances and evolves, 65% of survey respondents say their organizations are adopting AI as off-the-shelf products or services, while 35% are trying to create customized ones. systems and processes. Either way can work; Either way, transformational organizations are hiring outside AI expertise to help train internal resources, build custom tools, and find the right partners to collaborate on a fluid business environment.
Acquiring that human capital is now a major challenge. “The most successful organizations I’ve seen are the ones that invest outside of technical leadership,” a general manager of AI strategy at a nonprofit academic medical center said in the survey. “By investing in outside technical leadership, you bring people on board whose domain expertise is to answer these difficult technical questions and provide realistic feedback to non-technical leaders.”
Accelerating Value Across Different Operations and Sectors
Organizations planning to implement their AI ambitions should learn from the use cases that best support growth strategies for themselves and their sectors.
Finding use cases that are easyto achieve and deliver clear results will create internal momentum and cultural embrace that will accelerate AI’s potential as a catalyst. Use cases that seem too complex, too difficult to articulate, or too limited in their returns can discourage the motivation critical to an organization’s AI success.
The processes and practices required by organizations will guide AI strategies and decision making. Those needs vary by sector, and even within sectors: the prospect of cloud-pricing optimization may attract media and telecommunications, life sciences and health care, and energy, resources, and industrials; Predictive maintenance can be more attractive to government and public services; and voice assistants and chatbots may have applications for financial services to improve customer service.
The Deloitte AI Institute State of AI in the Enterprise report 5th Edition Includes detailed use cases of how organizations can use AI to grow. In each case, strategy drives adoption and implementation, not the other way around. And as more leaders determine how it can help more workers help more customers, AI continues to increase its potential to help people make better decisions at a speed and scale that made for growth.
Read the latest Deloitte AI Institute State of AI in the Enterprise Report.
