From HAL-9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey to the replicants in Blade Runner and Ava in Ex Machina, artificial intelligence has been a potent villain in many sci-fi stories. True to its form, it has continued to evolve and become evermore capable over time, even in movies that portray a world where AI takes complete control away from humans.
While entertaining on a Saturday night, these narratives also create anxiety in Monday planning meetings as teams assess ways to automate routine tasks and help their staff become more efficient. Generative AI is the new scary monster, evoking images of a chatbot creating unique responses for each customer—a nightmare scenario for CX teams, risk officers and anyone involved in corporate governance. But just as sci-fi thrillers show us the worst case scenario, recent warnings about GenAI highlight the extreme consequences of using the technology irresponsibly.
Not to suggest that AI does not come with risks, but sitting on tremendous business opportunities out of exaggerated fears is reckless. Especially when AI can significantly boost efficiency AND improve the customer experience with little risk at all. It might not be ideal for directly answering customer questions right now, but it can help live, human service teams become more productive and deliver better support.
The key is in leveraging GenAI to enhance—not replace—service reps. Two areas where AI can make service teams more efficient include:
- Autocomplete tools that learn from prior conversations, anticipate an answer and make suggestions that save representatives time. Automating routine and repetitive tasks lets representatives focus on more complex issues. Plus AI’s ability to learn means it starts to surface best-practice responses that have proven successful with other customers.
- Even for more complex issues, financial institutions should consider tools that offer AI-generated suggestions to guide the support staff and help them offer options that have been effective in similar scenarios. Think of it as on-going training, both for the AI application and the service staff, driving continuous improvement. Which can lead to more conversions and higher customer satisfaction rates.
Generative AI can help the CX management team too by automating analytics and performance metrics.
- Based on GenAI’s very broad learning base across many organizations, it can offer performance insight compared to peer organizations, elevate trends as they are occurring in real-time and assess progress beyond the organization’s set metrics.
Ultimately, the value of Gen AI comes down to how a financial institution uses it. Which brings us back to our movie analogy. Every villain possesses a unique capability that, used another way, could make them the hero of the story. The big opportunity for businesses today is in using Generative AI in the most efficient, beneficial way possible to make their organization the one everyone roots for—and not the monster.
