Artificial intelligence: (Not) an issue for SMEs?
Artificial intelligence and machine learning have become indispensable terms in the discussion about digital transformation. But when it comes to concrete applications of artificial intelligence, many companies are still in their infancy. But as we all know, children grow up fast.
How widespread is artificial intelligence in companies? And what does this mean for corporate culture, managers and employees? These questions were recently addressed in a study published jointly by EY and Microsoft. For this purpose, members of management boards as well as top and middle management in companies from 15 European countries were surveyed. In Switzerland, 20 companies, including AMAG, SBB, Credit Suisse, Jansen, Lonza, Swisscom and Visana, took part in the study. The conclusion of the study: All of these companies position themselves as advanced in terms of AI maturity, but do not occupy top positions in comparison with other European companies.
Data-driven industries leading the way
PwC comes to of a similar CEO survey come to the same conclusion: around 40 percent of the Swiss CEOs surveyed say they are not currently planning any AI applications. Less than ten percent say they have already implemented AI in their business. According to PwC, the reasons for this are complex. In some cases, Swiss companies have had other priorities in recent years. In addition, some companies have reservations about the performance of the technology or are critical of automation. An important building block is the handling or availability of data. The more comprehensive and complete data is available, the better AI systems can learn from it. Therefore, it is not surprising that the telecommunications (TMT) sector is the most advanced in terms of AI. "TMT and financial services sectors benefit from the fact that both industries are data-driven and already largely have the data quality and analytics tools needed for AI applications," analyzes the EY/Microsoft study in this regard. Accordingly, it is less costly for companies in these industries to launch pilot projects and develop further projects with more advanced AI applications.
SMEs as pacesetters?
Is AI not a big issue in SMEs either? This impression is deceptive. Among the top 100 startups listed by Startupticker, for example, a large proportion of IT-savvy companies are involved in some form of artificial intelligence, neural networks, data analysis or machine learning. And the SMEs surveyed opposite are also working on or with specific AI solutions. In other words, artificial intelligence is about to arrive in companies - and at an ever faster pace. In fact, it seems that it is smaller companies that are stepping on the gas when it comes to artificial intelligence. They develop the AI tools that are then used by large companies. This fits with the findings of the EY/Microsoft study, which found that the use of AI in the Swiss companies surveyed tends to proceed from the bottom up compared to their European peers. The PwC study, however, found no clear AI strategy in the companies it surveyed.
More EQ thanks to AI
The study by EY and Microsoft finds a correlation between the maturity of AI implementations and an organization's emotional intelligence (EQ). EQ is the ability to recognize other people's emotions and deal empathically with relationships. In business, this means: Openness, collaboration and customer focus. 80 percent of the most advanced companies in terms of AI describe themselves as emotionally intelligent. Conversely, only 16 percent of respondents who were rated least mature in AI considered themselves more than moderately competent in terms of emotional intelligence. "Our study shows that 61 percent of companies expect AI to help empower employees. Democratizing AI in a company frees up time for employees to be creative and innovative. Companies want exactly that because that's where the value is," said Dr. Marianne Janik, CEO of Microsoft Switzerland. Some companies also emphasize establishing a culture and leadership that embraces AI and is ready to face the challenges it brings.
Asked: Artificial intelligence not an issue for SMEs?
Here are some comments from companies for whom AI already plays a role in their business:
How high do you estimate the usage potential of AI for your company?
We see enormous potential primarily in demand-driven resource management and in the service desk. It is a major planning challenge to ensure that employees with the necessary knowledge are available on time for support, mandates and projects. This is precisely where AI can relieve employees with generated expert knowledge and support recruitment, training and deployment planning in a timely manner.
Where is AI already used in your company or your products?
The first interesting AI approaches are built into our software offerings from SAP, Thing Worx and Microsoft in the form of machine learning scenarios. They support our customers and us in recognizing recurring data patterns to trigger preventive actions, relieve employees and thus reduce risks.
What influence does the increased use of AI have on corporate culture? Does it need more emotional intelligence, for example?
When people are relieved of complex routine tasks, they can turn their attention more intensively to customer, supplier and internal relationships. In addition to specialist knowledge, social skills and emotional intelligence play a decisive role as success factors. The corporate culture benefits and becomes even more human.
AI also stirs up fears, for example of job losses. How can these fears be allayed?
Employees must first be shown the opportunities and limitations of AI. The intelligent helpers should relieve them of time-consuming routine tasks. The aim is to make complex tasks easier. Humans can invest their freed-up creative capacity in other tasks. This does not necessarily require better or different training, but an appropriately adapted work environment and good coaching.
How high do you estimate the usage potential of AI for your company?
In fact, we value the potential of AI so highly that our company's purpose is primarily to optimize and make our customers' processes and data more efficient using AI.
Where is AI already used in your company or your products?
We already implemented numerous models for data prediction and analysis based on Machine and Deep Learning for our SME customers. Our focus is on text and image analysis as well as customer churn prediction (churn analysis).
What influence does the increased use of AI have on corporate culture? Does it need more emotional intelligence, for example?
Open and honest communication with employees forms the basis for successful integration of AI. Training and education are important, as is demonstrating the benefits to employees.
AI also stirs up fears, for example of job losses. How can these fears be allayed?
The use of AI will not replace employees in the short term, but will complement teams by automating monotonous work. In the long term, there will certainly be a structural change.
