What will artificial intelligence in the workplace be like in the next 50 years?
There are a growing number of ways in which advanced AI has already been deployed for commercial purposes. Businesses are already starting to make good use of it through things like chatbots and voice assistants. But let’s look a little further afield at the next 50 years. What sorts of workplace capabilities is AI likely to have? Here are our five top predictions.
1. Answering all customer service enquiries
One of the primary uses of AI at the moment is to assist with customer enquiries. Automated chatbots on Facebook Messenger, for example, can be used to answer up to 90% of standard customer enquiries. But in the future, this could easily extend to handling more complex issues, like complaints and issuing refunds.
2. Producing tailored quotes
Currently, AI is limited to providing very limited responses based on predetermined inputs. But for businesses that need to supply very specific quotes, advanced AI could remove human involvement altogether. For example, within the insurance sector, AI could discuss very precise requirements and combine a whole host of variables to provide tailored, economically viable insurance quotes
3. Hiring the right staff
Staff turnover can be costly and damaging to businesses. And hiring the right staff is tough, as humans deploy subjective opinions on individuals they recruit. AI could easily become a far more effective way of analysing a prospect’s behavioural patterns more quickly and with less zero personal preference. Allowing for the right choice of candidates the first time around.
4. Offloading complex number crunching
Yes, humans can use calculators to help them make complex mathematical decisions. However, advanced AI can gather mathematical data and come to very precise quotations and pricing far faster than a human could. This can speed up negotiations and business offerings, at a fraction of the cost of hiring more human capital.
5. Strategic decision making
AI has the potential to gather information and variables from its surroundings to make sound strategic decisions. By analysing the industry and considering hundreds or thousands of variables all at once, they can help business leaders to make better long-term decisions. Allowing them to spot opportunities in the market and move faster than competitors. Once again, these decisions will be based solely off fact, rather than any human preferences or hidden personal motives.
The issue with AI is the sort of fear that individuals have around it. Don’t worry, we’re not stepping towards some sort of futuristic Terminator landscape, where robots rule. Quite the opposite. In fact, those benefiting most from AI are embracing the “us AND AI” mentality, as opposed to the “AI OR us” way of thinking. Which side will you lean towards?
