More and more companies are investing heavily in artificial intelligence, driven by the promise that AI will make them more productive and profitable. Practice is often less rosy and somehow everyone also feels the need to repeat the same mistakes without using real market knowledge. That will sound like a plea from WC duck but admit it which is more important, the result or the hobby. The idea that a technology solves problems by itself proves time and again to be an illusion.
Recently, a client invested heavily in improving a process with AI tools to automate it. The result? No growth, no improvement, just frustration. When we looked more closely, we found that the whole process was already fundamentally flawed. No AI is going to help with that. Only when the process was fixed manually did the results come.
This is the harsh reality that many companies prefer to ignore. AI magnifies what is already there. If your fundamentals are weak, AI accelerates your demise. If your processes are strong, AI can be a catalyst for growth. But only then. I’ve seen companies pour a fortune into my favorite topic chatbots and see their customer satisfaction plummet. Nowhere to go. At the same time, I saw organizations that cleverly deployed AI to give extra power to their best employees – and saw their sales increase dramatically.
The difference is not in the technology, but in the order. First, the basics must be in order. A company that automates clutter is perpetuating clutter – only faster and more expensive. But a company that knows its processes, understands where value is created and then strengthens it with AI can make huge leaps.
Yet a second misconception plagues many companies: using AI to boost the weakest links. The hope that the bottom of the organization will perform better thanks to technology is a persistent dream, but usually an expensive mistake. AI works best when it makes the strong stronger. Equipping the talented and top performers with digital superpowers creates real growth. So does the customer contact employee !
So AI is not a stand-alone strategy. It is a tool. A powerful tool, yes, but never a solution to bad processes or wrong choices. Companies that believe that technology will solve their problems on its own will be disappointed. Companies that understand that AI makes sense only when the basics are right will reap the benefits.
Therefore, the real question organizations need to ask themselves is not, “How do we apply AI?” but, “What problem do we actually want to solve?”
This blog was written by Serge Poppes, CEO of Pegamento.
