.webp)
Artificial intelligence has become an all-pervasive buzzword for businesses over the past few years. Everyone wants to know how AI will help them achieve their goals, from high-level employees to companies. Most people don’t realize that AI’s applications run much deeper than most people associate AI with, the typical chatbot or recommendation algorithm. In fact, AI is helping small businesses grow in some convenient ways.
But there is a problem with over-automating processes.
AI is designed to automate specific tasks. Many of these tasks can be time-consuming and tedious, or simply repetitive. These tasks can add up even for businesses with just a few workers. When companies are managing just a handful of people, it can be almost impossible to automate specific tasks due to the difficulty level of the task and the level of precision required. For example, if a person is tasked with copying 20 pages of paper, it would be impossible to reduce the amount of time it takes to get that job done by a factor of one hundred. Humans make certain decisions or perform certain tasks to save time and add efficiency to the processes. These tasks need to be split up into smaller components to make the automation process more efficient. However, there’s one problem with automating processes with humans: employees lose trust in their colleagues.
If your colleague performs the same task, they naturally want to be accurate and make sure the task gets done correctly. For the same reason, employees will be hesitant to trust an AI designed to make an automated decision. No matter how proficient, employees know that their performance can be easily and quickly evaluated by others. A great example of this is Facebook and Google.
When Facebook rolled out its AI-based facial recognition algorithms, it spent two years ensuring the system accurately identified people’s faces. Facebook’s engineers discovered that the system, which is meant to identify photos of humans, often had difficulty identifying objects like dogs, cats, and some fruits. Because of this, Facebook ended up modifying the technology to identify people more effectively. Although the companies decided to update their facial recognition algorithm, Facebook had to cut back the number of photos uploaded on its platform.
Similarly, Google faced a similar problem when its AI systems labeled black people gorillas. Google’s systems are designed to identify a person’s image based on a few pixels. To solve the problem of consistently labeling black people as gorillas, Google ended up removing its facial recognition technology from the Google Photos website.
Use technology for efficiency, not for the replacement of humans
Although these cases are extreme, artificial intelligence can be highly inaccurate. As humans, we often overestimate the accuracy of artificial intelligence. Because of this, AI is being applied in different ways to help with processes that involve humans. The last time I talked with your mother on Facebook Messenger, she didn’t care who I was. However, she was interested in the opportunity to save money on her cell phone bill. With the help of chatbots, your mother can save money every month. Although chatbots may be convenient for your mother, this technology has a long way to go before your mother trusts AI's decisions.
This is why companies use human employees to do certain parts of the process. This may be the only way to gain employee trust when using AI. In a recent study, Google concluded that when people have a high level of trust in their co-workers, they are more likely to take responsibility for their actions and be more likely to complete their work. However, these findings can be applied to how AI is used in our daily lives. For example, if I have a good friend, I would instead go out for a beer and talk about our problems rather than send an AI-based robot to do the same.
Automate what can be measured and what does not add value
While these examples are extreme, the fact is that people often turn to a human for their advice. Sometimes, people will approach their co-workers or a coffee shop barista. This is why artificial intelligence needs to be designed to understand human language. Humans can understand things in context a lot more than computers can.
While computers can’t understand context, they can excel in data crunching and filtering. AI can be helpful in fields like marketing, communications, and business development. However, this field is not complete because there are cases where humans have more wisdom. This is where artificial intelligence is still being developed, but it won’t be too long until we see the revolution AI is so close to becoming.
The key is to find better ways of working
With the right balance of human and digital, you can create a workforce that no longer has to be held hostage by its own time-wasting habits.
We’ve known for a while that the key to better productivity at work isn’t shutting out all distractions with a “no time-wasting” policy — the key is finding better ways of working, by understanding how your team works best.
And as we get further into the digital age, one of those ways is by using AI to automate repetitive tasks — so your team can focus on bigger and better things.
Want to find out more about how you can incorporate AI into your business? Contact us at assistiv.ai!