Management Review suggests that in order to see significant financial returns, organizations need a multidimensional, complex relationship with AI—one that involves several methods of learning and different modes of interaction.
Businesses everywhere are recognizing the power of AI to improve processes, meet customer needs, enter new spaces, and, above all, to gain sustainable competitive advantage. With this recognition has come an increased adoption of—and investment in—AI technologies. A global survey of more than 3,000 executives revealed that more than half of respondents are deploying AI: six out of ten have an AI strategy in 2020, up from four out of ten in 2018. AI solutions are more prolific and easier to deploy than ever before, and companies around the globe are seizing on the opportunity to keep up with this exciting trend. Yet despite their efforts—to hire data scientists, develop algorithms, and optimize processes and decision making—most companies aren’t seeing a significant return on their investments.
So, what allows a small number of companies to stand out from the crowd?
For them, AI isn’t just a path to automation; it’s an integral, strategic component of their businesses. To achieve significant financial benefits, companies must look beyond the initial, albeit fundamental, steps of AI adoption—of having the right data, technology, and talent in place, and organizing these elements around a corporate strategy. Currently, companies have only a 21% chance of achieving significant benefits with these fundamentals alone, though incorporating the ability to iterate on AI solutions with business users nearly doubles the number, to 39%. But it’s the final stage of AI maturity, of successfully orchestrating the macro and micro interactions between humans and machines, that really unlocks value. The ability to learn as an organization—by bringing together human brains and the logic of machines—is what gives companies a 73% chance of reaping the financial benefits of AI implementation.
More: To embrace AI’s full potential, companies must recognize that humans play an equally important role in the equation—and reshape themselves accordingly. Download the Full Report
Authors: Sam Ransbotham, Associate Professor, Boston College/MIT Sloan Management Review; Shervin Khodabandeh, Managing Director & Senior Partner, Los Angeles; David Kiron, Executive Editor, MIT Sloan Management Review’s Big Ideas initiatives; François Candelon, Managing Director & Senior Partner, Global Director of the BCG Henderson Institute
Paris; Michael Chu, Partner and Associate Director, Data Science, Silicon Valley – Bay Area; Burt LaFountain, Managing Director & Partner, Boston