The following was written by Greg Kihlström for Fast Company. Read the full article here.

There are likely many ways that artificial intelligence can benefit your organization, and you likely don’t have time to wait in order to reap the potential benefits.

While technology and marketing trends come and go (remember NFTs? the metaverse?), there seems to be something a little different with the current buzz around artificial intelligence (AI), and particularly generative AI. As much as you may be sick of hearing about ChatGPT, there are many other ways that this technology can be utilized to accelerate business growth. That said, if you have planned out key components of your digital transformation efforts that do not include AI-based tools, it wouldn’t be wise to simply “tack on” AI elements without thinking more strategically.

It’s not too late, but it’s important that you move quickly in some key areas. In this article, I’m going to talk about some ways to meaningfully incorporate AI into an ongoing digital transformation effort.

ALIGN AI WITH BUSINESS GOALS

Let’s start with the fundamentals. If simply adding an AI component to your transformation effort doesn’t help achieve a key objective, you’re going to likely add time and cost with little strategic impact. 

Make sure you’re applying AI in a way that truly helps you achieve the goals of your digital transformation initiative, as well as your overall business goals and objectives. Some questions you can ask to help here include the following:

• Does AI accelerate our ability to achieve our goals, or will it simply be a distraction?

• Does AI deepen the insights and decision-making abilities, or will it require expensive and time-consuming investments in data and technology infrastructure to reap those benefits?

• Does AI have a long-term beneficial impact on the organization, or will it simply be a short-term fix?

AI-based tools and processes can be a turbocharger added onto your transformation efforts, or it can simply be an add-on that offers little value. How closely you align AI with your business goals can make the difference.

This article was written by Greg Kihlström for Fast Company. Read the full article here.