Generative AI Business Strategy: Part 5 - Eight Takeaways and To-Dos

The Final Post in this Series

I hope the previous posts have provided some value to fellow business professionals out there in the matrix. Interestingly, when I started writing the first post I was still somewhat within the shiny toy mindset with GenAI, but after 3-4 months of heavy research and usage of ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, Meta and Claude I see business adoption trends forming and the increasing need for corporate diligence. I also see another trend forming that is exciting, but also concerning (see #7 below for that one).

Overall, there is still credible reason for business optimism, and even though we are drowning in AI hype, this is the time to truly identify and exploit the many business benefits of GenAI for individuals, teams and organizations.

Rather than post responses created by GPT tools about how to plan for GPT enablement (blah), here are my conclusions via 8 takeaways that are more personal and subjective, that tend to focus more on the human side of GenAI:

My 8 Takeaways and To Dos

1. This tech is impressive, try it, push it, then leverage diligently. Have you ever witnessed a technology more explosive and hyped as generative AI? Due to its broad applicability across all businesses, industries and corporate functions, it has been and continues to be headline news with stories of new use cases, benefits and failures. Do not consider GenAI as a passing fad, as it will become an integral part of our current and future business workflows, so keep it high on your priority list and look diligently for credible use cases.
2. Change is rapid and constant, monitor it. With so many big tech companies fighting for position, billions of dollars are being sunk into R&D resulting in new LLMs appearing weekly. Bigger, better, smaller, specialist models are improving accuracy and performance metrics. I keep up to date with several sources, but at the very least try to get a weekly LLM/GPT update from someone like Matt Wolfe who generates GenAI news summaries.
3. Form a plan, either for yourself, your team, or the whole organization. Depending on your role and seniority in the organization, your plan will vary. If you are responsible or highly influential at the organizational level, your execs will need to create a broader strategic plan and framework that includes data, infrastructure, governance, enablement, culture, collaboration, milestones and security. If you are running a team at the departmental level, and there is no corporate-wide GenAI program in place, it is possible to create a more localized plan to select a GPT and enablement plan for a smaller audience. Check prior posts in this blog series for practices. All individuals should have a GenAI plan for learning and continuous improvement, that can be as technical or non-technical as required and incremented onto whatever program the organization or team has in place.
4. Learn from others. Research relentlessly to find stories and case studies of other organizations that have started their GenAI journey. There is a plethora of information out there, so keep filtering until you find businesses and people similar to you. Here is a link to the Marketing AI Institute which pumps out really valuable content, in this case a summary of 2 organizations (Moderna and Asana) that went all in on GPT enablement in a true top-down approach.
5. Help non-technical colleagues with the AI mental barrier. Look around and believe in karma. You may not see it in their faces, but there is a percentage of the workforce who are terrified by generative AI. They may have Googled classes on GenAI and became even more discouraged by the technical nature of the training out there. Be their non-technical friend, and suggest the only skill they currently need is to be able to enter text prompts. They definitely don't need to learn Python to be competent with GPTs, make sure they know that. In my view it is up to the leadership of the organization, or team, to provide an overview of AI and GenAI to at least provide a background to this technology. Feel free to plagiarize this presentation that included an intro to AI and GenAI at a recent event.
6. Create a can-do collaborative culture. With a new technology that has the potential to benefit everyone, there is a danger of unhealthy competition. People have a tendency to try to gain advantage, even if it is with their co-workers and colleagues. With GenAI there needs to be a process and rules in place to promote collaboration, to reward those who share ideas and add value to others. Leadership should set an example by sharing their workflows and attempts. There should be cross-functional pilot projects, so all departments are part of the transformation, where experimentation is welcomed. Find a few evangelists in the business who are motivated and motivating. Create a file-share, Slack or Teams space for people to visit and to contribute to. Have monthly or quarterly gatherings to share feedback and progress. Look at gamification for ideas on making progress. Be wary of workers who resist, even sabotage enablement efforts. This is all much easier said than done, but make sure it is supported and enabled top-down.
7. Automation. So this is where the conversation gets really interesting, but also ethically tricky. If you or your team have rudimentary skills in creating automations with products like Zapier, Make or Microsoft Power Automate, the game can change quite significantly. These automation tools can integrate GenAI conversations with other business tools and systems, meaning you can now replace the human effort in selected workflows. One example might be a sales support person receiving incoming web requests from prospects, and responding by (e.g.) email based on their knowledge of prospect needs, their intent data, and a determination of which product/service would serve them best based on an analysis of all the variables in play. By integrating several tools into an automated workflow, that now includes a GenAI-based analysis and creation of fully customized email responses, the human is completely removed from the sequence. In my opinion, this is where we will start to see the gradual shift in AI replacing human effort in sales, marketing, HR, design, finance, supply chain, and some layers of management decision-making. Perhaps we can save the ethical considerations and leadership practices for another blog post, as this is not a short conversation.
8. Accept, Engage and Accelerate. Knowing that there is no stopping this tidal wave of technological and process change, it might be best to buy a nice surfboard and ride this one, and asap. By this time next year, GenAI may be unrecognizable from this text prompt-based tool, and LLMs will become way more accurate, flexible and powerful. If your glass is half empty, don't be on the wrong side of this wave. If half full, enjoy this amazing transformation in the business world and achieve more than you (and your competition) could ever imagine.

Thanks for your time today.? Here are the other articles in the Generative AI Business Strategy series:

• Part 1: GenAI Basics: Concepts, technology, outputs, opportunity, risk, adoption.
• Part 2: Business Opportunity.? For individual and organizational transformation.
• Part 3: Business Risk and Mitigation. Privacy, IP, compliance, quality ++ concerns.
• Part 4: Prompting: The key skill to unlocking GenAI.
• Part 5: Series Wrap - Eight Takeaways and To Dos.