Is Generative AI Right for You?

Generative AI (GenAI) adoption has surged recently, becoming a top AI technique in businesses according to Gartner surveys. This popularity stems from its potential for significant business improvements. However, GenAI is not a catch-all solution. It is just one part of the broader AI landscape, and solving most business problems requires a mix of AI techniques. Relying too much on GenAI can make you expect too much from it and use it in situations where it won't work well.

Map your use case against the relevant use case family. GenAI is:

• Highly useful: Content generation, conversational user interfaces, knowledge discovery
• Somewhat useful: Segmentation/classification, recommendation systems, perception, intelligent automation, anomaly detection/monitoring
• Hardly useful: Prediction/forecasting, planning, decision intelligence, autonomous systems

GenAI may also be a poor fit for your use case if the risks that come with it are unacceptable and cannot be effectively mitigated.?These include unreliable outputs, data privacy, intellectual property, liability, cybersecurity and regulatory compliance, either alone or in combination with one another.

For areas where GenAI does not rank as “highly useful,” consider other AI techniques.?

Common established AI techniques to investigate include nongenerative machine learning (ML), optimization, simulation, rules/heuristics and knowledge graphs.

Emerging techniques, such as causal AI, neuro-symbolic AI and first-principles AI, are also worth tracking.

Trying a simpler alternative AI technique before diving into generative AI can be a smart move; they are often less risky, less expensive and easier to understand.

Source: Is Generative AI Right for You? Explore Alternatives & Limitations (gartner.com)