Companies urged to implement AI with focused use cases

Careful assessment and governance is the key.

Organisations should adopt artificial intelligence (AI) to address persistent business challenges, rather than merely keeping up with technological trends, says Emmanuel Bonoan, Vice Chairman and Chief Operating Officer of KPMG Philippines. 

According to Bonoan, AI provides significant benefits when applied to specific use cases, particularly in enhancing customer service and streamlining operations.

“You can look at it from a customer perspective, and one way that customers can be served by AI is the use of chatbots. A lot of customers wouldn’t mind being assisted by a bot, as long as that bot is complete and addresses the relevant problems,” Bonoan explained.

He emphasised that AI adoption should focus on solving persistent business issues. “The best way to get convinced about using AI is to look for a problem that you have, and it has to be a problem directly related to the business,” he said. Once AI proves successful in addressing a specific challenge, it can be rolled out for broader use cases.

He also stressed the importance of proper assessment before adopting AI. “You'd really have to make that assessment because there are a number of factors to consider,” Bonoan said, noting that businesses need to determine whether AI is necessary or if a simpler solution, such as robotic process automation, would suffice. 

Additionally, involving process owners and maintaining strong governance are crucial for successful AI implementation.