However, you have to ask the question, is it just good optics to be talking about it – or are real businesses on the ground actually implementing it yet?
We can take for granted that enterprise level companies are making use of its power. They have full divisions of IT operations ready to put the technology to work. Or can hire specialist to develop custom software that integrates the intelligence of AI. But what about the average business that is run by a small set of people, not mega divisions of specialists?
AI in Everyday Business
If you were to believe the hype you’d think that every business owner is utilizing an army of AI agents. However, setting these things up takes time and most business operators are already busy enough as it is.
This means the implementation of AI is likely to be much more gradual, unless external specialists are brought in to overhaul operations
Plus there’s the human element of pushing staff out, replacing them and getting rid of the loyal workforce that has built your business to date.
That’s not to say you can’t plug into an AI Platform and let your team have access to a suite of amazing tools though. But straight up replacing them, it might not be the best move for a lot of managers right now.
What are the Real World Stats Telling Us?
The cold hard facts are quite often hard to grasp in terms of the number of employees being straight up exchanged for AI agents and technology.
Some reports are suggesting that it’s about 10,000 jobs for the first half of this year source. But in reality, it’s almost impossible to know. Especially seen as how employment data lags behind the actual numbers on the ground – And AI is moving at an astonishingly fast pace.
When you look at the population of the US though, currently standing at around 347 million this job loss statistic does seem fairly insignificant.
So even this suggests, that although he bigger corporations are equipped to make use of AI – it’s not necessarily resulting in mass job losses yet.
What does the Future Hold?
At the moment most people’s experience of AI is limited to chat bots like ChatGPT, but this is just the tip of the iceberg.
There are huge advances in voice generated AI, which could replace support workers in call centers within a few short years.
What does voice generated AI mean? Well, imagine you call up a support line to get help with a problem. Right now the customer service rep or tech support worker takes the details of your case, logs into a system, looks at your customer file and is able to advise you on your query/issue.
But imagine the same thing could be done by an AI software, that can speak back to you in a 100% convincing human voice. That technology is already here and it’s being deployed – you may have even spoken to an AI persona and not realized it. Scary!
