How artificial intelligence can simplify your business operations

Artificial intelligence (AI) is making its way into many different industries, and for good reason. It can solve some of the world’s most complex problems and augment human capacities in very powerful ways. 

AI has the potential to transform the way we do business and streamline operations within companies so that they run more smoothly. Businesses must look beyond fears of artificial intelligence replacing jobs or eliminating user agency from their processes to see how it can improve their operations instead. 

With the right strategy, AI can help eliminate high-cost operational redundancies within a company’s business process flows, which in turn frees up resources for other value-added activities as opposed to operational tasks. Read on for insights about how AI can simplify your business operations

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Leverage AI for Operational Automation

AI can help automate disparate activities within a company’s business process flows. The tech can be used to automate low-value work that consumes a significant amount of resources within an organisation, freeing up employees for higher-value activities. 

AI can also be used to help optimise an organisation’s workflow. To optimise an inefficient process, employees need to identify the inefficiencies in their workflow and then take action to eliminate them, which can take up a lot of time - which could be better spent elsewhere. With AI, companies can leverage the tech to automate the workflow optimisation process and eliminate inefficiencies in a company’s workflow. 

AI can help optimise an organisation’s workflow so that employees don’t have to spend time looking for specific information, such as data about a customer. By leveraging AI, companies can automate workflow to eliminate inefficiencies and free up resources for higher-value activities.

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Define Goals for End-to-End Processes

One of the keys to success when automating a company’s business processes with AI is defining clear goals for the operation. The goals should be aligned with the company’s strategic goals and business mission. For example, if a company aims to increase revenue, the goal for the operation being automated should be to increase sales. 

Similarly, what activities should the operation include to achieve this goal? By defining goals for the operation, companies can determine the value proposition of AI. AI can help automate a company’s workflow if the operation includes activities with high value, such as helping sales representatives close deals and increase their revenue.

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Analyze Data to Find Operational inefficiencies

Building the right AI solution requires a lot of data to be fed into the tech. AI relies on applying data science techniques to the data it’s fed. Therefore, the more data a company has, the more value AI can bring to the table. 

To find operational inefficiencies within a company’s business process flows, the tech should be used to analyse data. This can enable the company to identify where its resources are being used inefficiently. For example, an AI system can be programmed to monitor and track customer behaviour data, such as average order size and purchase amount, or how much of your website they view before buying.

By analysing data, AI can enable the organisation to identify where it’s wasting resources. From there, the organisation could treat this information as a red flag and investigate the issue further, which could lead to cost reduction opportunities.

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Establish a baseline before automated operations

Most companies are hesitant to automate their business processes with AI because they worry that the process will eliminate the customer experience. The customer experience is a key differentiator in a company’s offerings, and AI shouldn’t be used to eliminate it. However, it’s important to establish a baseline for the customer experience before automating a company’s operations with AI. 

By setting a baseline for the customer experience, companies can ensure that customer experience doesn’t suffer. If the AI operation is focused on areas to increase efficiency, resources can be reallocated to customer support activities. 

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Use Adaptive Automation

AI can be used to automate a company’s workflow, but the tech shouldn’t be applied blindly. Different use cases require different strategies. For example, if a company uses different technologies to run its business processes, depending on the use case, AI can be used to automate one set of processes and manual processing could be used for another set of processes. 

The tech should be used to automate the least cost-intensive set of business process flows. There should be a fine balance between AI and manual operations. There should be a clear strategy behind the use of automated operations within the company’s business process flows. If an organisation wants to use AI to automate the least cost-intensive set of its business process flows, it must be wary of eliminating user agency.

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Bottom Line

Artificial intelligence has the potential to transform the way businesses operate, from solving complex problems to freeing up human resources for higher-value activities. 

However, companies must look beyond fears of AI replacing jobs or eliminating user agency from their processes to see how it can improve operations instead. Businesses must leverage AI to eliminate high-cost operational redundancies within the company’s business process flows, free up resources for other value-added activities, and establish a baseline for the customer experience before implementing the tech.