Getting Started with Artificial Intelligence

Chapter 6. Looking Forward

Over the next decade, AI won’t replace managers, but managers who use AI will replace those who don’t.

Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, Harvard Business Review, 2017

Throughout this book, we’ve discussed practical techniques for implementing AI in the enterprise. Ranging from NLP to chatbots to computer vision, these technologies provide businesses not only significant cost savings over the long term but also the ability to solve problems they previously could not.

While we’ve discussed the benefits and methods of implementing AI in the enterprise, there are a few additional aspects any AI practitioner should keep in mind for the future. The next few sections discuss some of these forward-looking areas in the enterprise that artificial intelligence will impact.

First, let’s recap our initial discussion of AI in the first chapter. Despite what we see in the media, it’s important to remember that we’re not talking about building artificial general intelligence in the enterprise (at least in the relatively short term anyway!). Instead, we’re talking about building augmented intelligence for the enterprise. Augmenting human intelligence is more about scaling our human capabilities and helping employees make better decisions, versus creating a newly intelligent lifeform.

Enterprise technologies that automate and detect patterns can now advise and enhance human expertise, empowering both employees and applications to make richer, more data-driven decisions. ...