How to Harness Intelligent Tech to Streamline Your Business
The pace of technological development in the present day has caught many people by surprise, with the necessary of keeping pace having become non-negotiable in double-quick time. From intelligent automation to seamless networking, as well as the ever-present question of AI, businesses are surrounded by questions of efficiency, insight and scalability. While the potential offered by new technology is indisputable, its effective harnessing involves more than simply plugging and playing.
Success in harnessing these tools will be governed by thoughtful, transparent implementation. If used intelligently, technology can free up time, improve customer satisfaction and relations, and sharpen focus. Used poorly, on the other hand, the same technology can risk alienating customers and damaging brand integrity. So the most important question is: How can businesses streamline their processes in a way that is smart, responsible, and sustainable?
Let’s take a look at some of the tools available, how they can best be used, and the critical line between enhancing your business and handing it over to speculative technology.
Understanding the tech you are using
Before diving head-on into how to use technology, it is important to understand the component technologies at play and why they are of value.
AI is at the heart of the current revolution. No longer simply a “dark art” used by research scientists, it is now being used in businesses for purposes ranging from content summarization to data analysis. For businesses that have learned how to harness it, it offers a handy assistant that can improve customer relations and anticipate employee needs.
Automation is something else, but related to AI. It can be used to handle repetitive tasks that keep human team members out of the areas where they are most effective. With minimal, but carefully curated input, automation is capable of streamlining operations and minimizing individual errors.
Networking is the glue that holds it all together. From cloud-based systems to internal infrastructure, reliable networking helps to connect users to tools, and tools to one another, securely and without friction - as long as it is understood and used correctly.
All of the above are inevitably going to play a part in the future of business, and when used correctly can help to ensure that your business is leading rather than following the wave of development.
Streamlining processes without losing the human touch
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One of the most heavily-trailed advantages of modern tech is its ability to take on routine, time consuming tasks. If your lead sales professionals are spending hours sorting information into neat columns, it’s a little bit like Einstein handling the internal mail. Used well, AI can triage customer queries and summarize data.
There’s a “but” coming here, and it’s this: There is an ever-increasing need to strike a balance, especially where tasks involve emotion, context, and ethics.
Take as an example the way that companies use AI to handle incoming complaints. While a bot might react to certain keywords and provide a prepared response, this is not what a frustrated customer needs when they really want reassurance or a nuanced response. Similarly, businesses that use AI to draft HR correspondence and disciplinary notices risk looking dangerously insensitive - and not a little incompetent.
This doesn’t mean that AI tools shouldn’t be used, merely that they should be used with care and oversight. The best practice is to let the machines do the standard legwork, while humans retain the final say. You might use AI to generate a draft, but let a human review and edit it before sending. Automation can collect the information from a customer, but should flag ambiguous content to be reviewed by a human.
If your vision of AI is to eliminate human decision-making, you’re missing the point; it’s there to elevate the eventual decision by cutting out the non-variables.
Staying transparent about how you use tech
As businesses grow more reliant on digital tools, customers are becoming more aware of the presence of AI in their interactions. There is a growing expectation that companies at least be honest about how and when AI is used; particularly where customer service is concerned.
Transparency is an essential element of trust. To achieve this, you will typically need to disclose when a chatbot is being used, and let customers know how decisions are being made. Some companies have started including tooltips in live chat windows to explain when a customer is speaking to a bot, and offering opt-outs or clear escalation paths to a real person. A comprehensive - and clearly signposted - privacy policy can also underline your commitment to ethical use of technology.
Most customers won’t mind that technology is playing a part in the process - they just want to know that a thinking, feeling human is in the driving seat.
Integrating chatbots as a strategic tool
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Chatbots are a clear case study in the understanding of technology use in modern business. They’ve been in existence for some time, and the way they have developed carries some important lessons.
Today’s chatbot technology is capable of understanding natural language, offering personalized recommendations, and escalating issues to where they need to be handled. They can serve customers around the clock and deliver consistent service. But successful use depends on thoughtful deployment.
Organizations exploring how to custom build a chatbot for customer service need to consider how it aligns with their goals. It is essential to look beyond the labor-saving tech and focus on how it can serve the customer’s needs regarding usability, tone, and data handling. A good chatbot acts like a concierge, making customers’ experience more positive, rather than a gatekeeper holding them at arms’ length. Once installed, it should also be regularly trained and updated to make sure it’s performing to a specific standard.
Key pitfalls to avoid when implementing tech solutions
There is a temptation, when one hears of the power of automation and AI tools, to adopt it as far and wide as possible. The more labor and money you can save, the better, or so goes the theory. The reality is different, of course. Indiscriminate application and implementation can easily backfire. Here are a few common traps, and how to avoid them.
- Over-reliance on automation: Not every process that can be automated should be automated. If a customer’s issue is complex, it is always best handled by a human who can appreciate the nuances.
- Untrained or biased AI models: AI can only ever be as good as the data that it is trained on. If it is trained on limited, or biased, data then it will reproduce those biases. If your chatbot routinely misunderstands regional dialects or your hiring tool tends to filter out demographic groups, the result can be extremely detrimental to your reputation.
- Bottlenecking: If your automation tools work through data but your internal network is slow, then everything can grind to a halt. Building processes that work to the optimal speed level will avoid people being left with nothing to do.
Any adoption of streamlined tech processes should begin with a dry run, to ensure that the work goes as smoothly as it promises to. At this stage, any amendments that need to be made can be.
Why networking is the backbone of smart tech
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No part of a business, automation or AI included, works in a vacuum. Behind the scenes, a robust network is what allows more automated processes to work as seamlessly as they are intended to.
Take as an example a sales assistant who is working remotely, using an AI tool to analyze customer feedback, and a separate system that is designed to automate quote generation. Without a secure, high-speed network connection to sync all of these tools, productivity will suffer. Equally, a chatbot that is intended to respond in real time can be hindered by intermittent connectivity, or by misconfigured firewalls.
Modern business networks are, more and more, intended to be cloud-first, mobile-optimized, and built with security as a core aspect. VPNs, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and intelligent routing are not just for IT departments, they are now increasingly a necessity for entire organizations.
Best practices for efficiency
If you are just getting started with using a form of technology, there are some principles you’d be well-advised to stick to in order to ensure a smooth rollout.
- Start with a single, narrowly-focused use case: Don’t try to overhaul your processes all at once. Instead, choose a repetitive, low-risk process: invoice managing (and not payment processing), or appointment reminders (not full calendar management).
- Test, then test again (and maybe again): Your initial launch should be a pilot project through which you collect feedback. If necessary, make adjustments before running another pilot - a delayed launch is better than a failed one.
- Train your team: Tools are only as effective as the people using them; and only as effective as the people are allowed to be. Ensure that staff understand the new system, know how to override it if necessary, and where to report issues.
Final thoughts: Tech as an enabler, not a replacement
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We’ve had forms of automation for decades, and their effectiveness has within it examples for us to follow. No pilot, for example, would take off and then let autopilot fly the plane uninterrupted for a transatlantic trip. Tech - and especially AI or automation - can make things far more convenient and efficient when it is given the chance. But it should never be considered a replacement for human ingenuity; the consequences are too costly.
