Building future workplaces: Elevating human potential with AI as a trusted ally

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transcending its boundaries in 2024, evolving from a mere concept to a transformative force in workplaces around the world.The introduction of AI tools that can act as virtual assistants, capable of answering questions, generating content, and automating actions, has ignited a wave of excitement, promising to redefine what everyday work looks like

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Published: May 9, 2024 04:10:24 PM IST

Updated: May 9, 2024 04:16:52 PM IST

A recent Indeed report highlights that companies in India foresee a bright future with the adoption of AI, with more than 7 in 10 respondents saying they expect tech to personally empower business leaders and themselves. Slack’s Workforce Index research revealed that 94% of executives recognise that incorporating AI into their company is an urgent priority, and the use of AI tools in the workplace is rapidly on the rise - one in four desk workers globally saying they have tried AI tools for their work.

Along with the excitement, however, it is imperative to acknowledge and address the trust concerns that exist. There are legitimate concerns around the security of data once it is fed into AI tools, not to mention the accuracy or usefulness of what comes back when hallucinations occur. History has taught us valuable lessons about the concerns of embracing technological advancements at all costs, often leaving people behind or exposed to unforeseen risks. As AI continues to evolve and become more sophisticated, we must take a proactive stance to harness its power while mitigating the risks. The solution lies in placing humans at the helm of AI, ensuring that our judgement and values remain the guiding force.

While engaging in every AI interaction or reviewing every AI-generated output may be unrealistic, we can design robust, system-wide controls that empower the technology to focus on high-judgement tasks that require human oversight.

Imagine a scenario where AI systems review and summarise millions of customer profiles, unlocking unprecedented insights and streamlining processes. Simultaneously, humans are empowered to lean in and apply their judgement in ways that AI cannot, building trust and ensuring that decisions are aligned with ethical principles.

The key to making the most of the AI revolution lies in adopting a people-centric approach. Building AI that is people-centric and aims to augment rather than replace humans, that begins every conversation with data, and includes guardrails for safe implementation is fundamental to us making the most of the AI revolution.

Specifically, here are three ways that we can keep humans at the helm of AI and ensure AI is trusted:

1) Effective prompt-building helps automate in authentic ways: Prompts, or the instructions we send to generative AI models, are very powerful and have the potential to guide millions of outputs. Crafting effective prompts, and seeing the likely output in near real time, can help organisations ensure they get the AI outcome they want, with the opportunity to tune and revise their prompts so they provide more helpful, accurate, and relevant results.

2) Audit trails can help spot what we’ve missed: Having a robust audit trail allows customers to assess AI’s track record and pinpoint where their AI assistant went right and wrong. It can also help identify issues across large datasets that humans might not spot; and can empower us to use our judgement to make adjustments based on the needs of our organisation.

3) Data controls help better guard data: Designing robust controls to help businesses securely action their data will enable organisations to effectively harness their data for AI-powered insights and intelligence, while data controls like permission sets, access controls, and data classification metadata fields empower humans and AI models alike to protect and manage sensitive data.

Slack AI is a great example of this people-centric approach. It uses a company’s conversational data from work happening across every project, team, and topic to help users work faster and smarter, find and prioritise information easier, and stay ahead of the work day. Importantly, it is also secure. The data accessed is within Slack, stays in the control of the company, never leaves Slack and is never used for model training. Trust is intrinsic to how we designed and built the product, and combining that level of security with the simplicity of the user experience, embedded in the users’ flow of work, is what sets Slack AI apart.

As we navigate the uncharted waters of AI advancements, our collective responsibility is to strike the delicate balance between innovation and ethical vigilance. The right balance between human and machine intelligence is essential to unlock incredible efficiencies while maintaining a firm grip on considerations of trust.

If we embrace this coexistence, we can leverage AI's formidable capabilities to automate mundane tasks, streamline processes, and uncover valuable insights while liberating humans to channel their unique strengths – creativity, judgement, and the ability to forge deeper connections.

The human-AI combination is the key to creating more productive businesses, more empowered employees, and ultimately, more trustworthy AI.

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