The Benefits of Generative AI

As a company designed to help clients transform their digital customer experiences, we’ve seen companies rapidly pivot their strategies to figure out how and where to invest time and resources into generative AI technologies. From chatbots to ChatGPT, to deepfake technology and AI-generated photos, generative AI has a hold on the business world and companies are scrambling, trying to figure out where it best fits and what they can do to leverage the technology into something beneficial for their brand.

What does generative AI mean?

By definition (albeit, ChatGPT’s definition) generative artificial intelligence, refers to a category of AI that involves creating or generating new content, data, or information that is similar to, or indistinguishable from, human-created content. It’s a type of AI that isn’t generating a replica, but instead, creating something so uncannily close through learned patterns and relationships within a given dataset. It’s a tool that most industries could potentially benefit from – from music composition to fashion design, to creative writing and healthcare imaging, there’s a use case for nearly every facet of the business world. For those companies in particular with daunting customer experiences, it’s an opportunity to shine and stand out from the competition by reducing wait times, remaining consistent, data analysis and the opportunity to scale a hyper-personalized experience.

The benefits of generative AI

As companies continue to onboard, research, and implement generative AI technologies they’ll begin to reap the benefits that it should help to produce, both internally and externally. In a recent webinar, Leveraging AI to Optimize Customer Experiences, featuring HGS Digital President & CEO, Venk Korla and Forrester Research Principal Analyst, Max Ball, value consideration was a big topic, with the experts highlighting key benefits including:

• Enhanced creativity – AI inspires and augments human creativity, generating new ideas and designs.
• Improved CX – Personalized interactions, recommendations, and tailored content enhance customer satisfaction.
• Increased Efficiency and Productivity – Automation and data analysis save time and effort, boosting productivity.
• Accelerated Research and Development – AI speeds up scientific discovery and development in various fields.
• Enhanced Decision-Making – Data-driven insights and predictive modeling aid in informed decision making.
• Accessibility and Inclusion – AI makes technology more accessible and inclusive for all individuals.
• New Business Opportunities – AI opens avenues for innovative business models and revenue streams.

This list isn’t extensive, but it’s areas where the business world is benefiting most from the technology. As different iterations of generative AI become available, the list is surely to grow.

Is generative AI the solution?

While there are many benefits to the inclusion of generative AI in an organizational strategy, it’s important to note that many, many things need to be addressed before generative AI can face customers directly – bias and quality/consistency are among the ones to stand out. Generated content needs to be of high quality and consistent and if an organization is putting generative AI front and center without ensuring that the output quality is there – the whole strategy fails.

Additionally, generative AI, having been created off a large dataset, can inadvertently learn biases present in its training data. For example, one caller could inquire about needing help with a recent bill they received. If there’s bias, the generative AI could respond with something to the effect of, “I’m happy to help you, bills can be confusing for some people that aren’t great with numbers.” The AI in this case is assuming they need help because they don’t understand the numbers, when in reality, they were calling to find out why it went up so much. Organizations must take the time to identify and mitigate biases to ensure fair and biased output.

For these two reasons alone, generative AI shouldn’t be considered the cream of the crop to any organizational strategy. But there’s also other things to address including:

• Ethical and legal considerations
• Privacy
• Transparency
• Scalability
• Testing and Validation

As Venk and Max continued their discussion around generative AI, it was pointed out that utilizing generative AI can enable hyper-personalized customer experiences in a way that we’ve never seen before. But it’s also important to note that while there’s a slew of benefits from using generative AI, it won’t get you there on its own. If the business world uses the technology under the notion that to build a superior CX one must implement a superior human plus digital strategy, we will see wild growth over the next couple of years, but in addition, customer experiences that will ultimately attract unprecedented customer loyalty and employee retention.