If you think AI has already irrevocably changed your role, think again. The full impact of AI on professional responsibilities will be felt in the months and years ahead.
That’s the opinion of Kirsty Roth, chief operations and technology officer at business information services specialist Thomson Reuters, who reflected on her firm’s recently released research into the use of AI in modern enterprises.
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The Future of Professionals Survey, which polled 2,275 professionals and C-level executives from more than 50 countries, found that 80% of respondents believe AI will have a high or even transformational impact on their work over the next five years. Almost two-fifths (38%) expect to see those changes in their organization this year.
“These are people in normal day jobs,” she said. “We’re not just talking about engineers or technologists. We’re talking about professionals in all lines of business who are already using AI.”
Roth reflected on the pace of change and suggested that AI adoption rates are much faster than in earlier digital transformation waves, such as those for e-commerce or cloud computing.
The survey found that more than half (55%) of professionals have either experienced significant changes in their work in the past year or anticipate major shifts in the coming year.
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However, Roth told ZDNET that these AI adoption rates are just the beginning, and professionals and their bosses should brace for further change.
“The impact will be huge,” she said. “What’s more, we haven’t seen the full effect yet. These are early days for AI.”
Roth, who is driving AI-enabled transformation in her own business, said business leaders should focus on three areas as they prepare for change.
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Step 1: Make AI accessible
Roth said business leaders must ensure their staff can access the best possible tools depending on their area of work.
Thomson Reuters’ research suggests almost half (46%) of organizations have invested in new AI-powered technology within the past year, and 30% of professionals regularly use AI to start or edit their work.
Roth said companies that don’t explore which tools are right for a specific role won’t be able to reap the benefits of AI.
“Ensure everyone in your company has access to AI and is using it,” she said.
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“Many people talk about the revenue or efficiency opportunities from emerging technology. I think the key thing to recognize is that professionals who aren’t using AI will quickly find themselves unable to do their work.”
Survey respondents who said their leaders were leading by example were 1.7 times more likely to see benefits from AI compared to those who said their leaders were not.
Roth said everyone in the organization must learn about AI’s uses and potential impact: “We all have a duty to stay on top of these changes, or we won’t be employed in the future.”
Step 2: Share best practices
While more than half (53%) of survey respondents said they believed their organization already experiences some benefits from AI, almost a third (30%) said their company is moving too slowly in AI adoption.
The research suggested that the pursuit of return on investment from AI must be a collaborative effort among leaders, professionals, and support staff.
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“Find a good way to share best practices,” said Roth. “You typically find there are good, creative people in pockets of the company that come up with clever ways to use AI across more advanced use cases.”
However, she warned other business leaders that those smart ideas are useless if they’re locked away in confined areas. “Get those things shared and ensure people understand what’s working and what’s not.”
Step 3: Talk to your peers
Roth also encouraged business leaders and professionals to look beyond the firewall.
The research found that organizations with a visible AI strategy are almost four times more likely to benefit from AI than firms without significant adoption plans.
She said business and digital leaders who communicate with their industry peers about their AI strategy will gain valuable insights.
“I talk to my peers all the time in different types of companies as to what they’re doing and what’s working for them. You’ll get an awful lot of intelligence like that.”
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Roth said the good news is that her conversations with other CIOs suggest there is broad recognition of AI’s potential.
“They just need to ensure they’ve got leadership support to push their changes through, and a handful of the right people to help them think through what use cases are going to work and how to get the transformation underway.”
Tracking and tracing the benefits of AI
Thomson Reuters’ research suggests the benefits for companies that encourage, foster, and develop a burgeoning professional interest in AI are significant.
Survey respondents predicted that AI will save them five hours weekly or about 240 hours in the next year, for an average annual value of $19,000 per professional.
However, proving your organization is delivering these kinds of results isn’t straightforward.
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Roth said her experiences suggest many companies struggle to understand where people spend their workdays and how AI can help them save time.
That’s a problem when one of the oft-repeated claims about AI is that it helps people reduce the administrative burden and focus on so-called higher-value tasks.
“What we’re discovering is that if you ask people, they aren’t very good at guessing how AI saves them time,” she said.
Roth said business leaders who ensure their workforce isn’t left behind as the AI transformation accelerates find ways to track and trace the benefits.
“You’ve got to make sure that usage is clear. A simple example is that when we started, we just said, ‘Are people using the tools?’ That was a high-level question,” she said.
“Now we are much more specific and ask, ‘Are people using tools every day? Are they a core part of the way they work? Are they using them for a certain amount of time in the day?’ Success is about having much more insight on how AI tools are used in someone’s day-to-day workflow versus just summarizing one meeting.”
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Roth gave an example from her own business. Engineers using AI to speed up their coding time exponentially have more time to focus on higher-value tasks, which she said include developing new ideas and business models.
“What we’re starting to see with our best engineers is that some of the simple things, like coding and testing, are being reduced significantly,” she said.
“Therefore, they’ve got more time to think about, ‘OK, what’s next? What do I want to build after this? And what does my customer want me to put in the product that’s coming next?’ Shifting their time allocation like that is a big benefit.”
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