Misconceptions about AI implementation

- There is a broadly held misconception that AI will replace humans in the workforce. I think it's important to reinforce the many critical ways that human work will persist even as AI capabilities expand. (gentle music) - One of the most common misconceptions is that it will magically fix all of our data challenges or disparate systems. - It feels like magic, but it's not actually magic. You have to work on the process. You have to understand the process, map it out, understand the opportunity to improve the process, and then find what technology could potentially improve the process, transform the process, or remove the process. - A big misconception about implementing AI within supply chain is not recognizing the revolutionary and disruptive nature of AI, especially generative AI. - The labor economy is going to be fundamentally transformed and the organization chart will be upended, but that will lead to new opportunities, which will create new work roles like AI trainers, agent and data specialists, AI ROI analysts, and AI strategists across different functional areas of the business. - I think it's important that leaders not underestimate the change management and culture behavior changes that need to happen for AI to be successfully implemented. We must support AI efforts with purposeful and practical steps to drive culture and behavioral changes. - The biggest misconception is thinking AI implementation is just a technology project. It's actually a people and process transformation. By recognizing and addressing this misconception early, ensuring leadership messages align with reality, preparing your data and people, and focusing on meaningful business metrics, executives can steer AI projects to truly transform sales in a positive, sustainable way. - One of the biggest misconceptions that we sometimes struggle with internally and that I know customers struggle with, is that you have to have the perfect plan. You have to have a big transformation plan on the table, versus really enabling your teams and people to embrace this, to drive improvement, to get better, and to scale what works over time. - In my experience, there is no perfect plan. The AI world is evolving at such a rapid pace anyway. The most important thing is to get going, start learning, so that you can put that learning toward making progress. It's about progress rather than perfection. And a great way to get started is through experimentation. - By honing your skills, you can complement AI technology and ensure better decision making. And the organizations and industries that invest in AI skilling today will be the leaders of tomorrow. - We say at Microsoft that it's progress over perfection. And if you lean into that daily, and enabling your employees to embrace this technology and to give it a try, it will create an effect over time where it adds on itself, and where we see greater and greater value being created, and where we find that we are truly transforming processes to the better for our customers. (bright music)