AI Consulting & Training: Bridging Business Success with AI Potential, by Mike Allton

1. How does AI consulting help companies bridge the gap between AI potential and practical implementation ?

One of the key challenges with AI technology, different from other new technologies, is that it doesn't have an innate purpose. Similar to how electricity is only useful when powering equipment, artificial intelligence must be paired with specific tools or tactics in order to be useful.

That's where a consultant can prove invaluable.

An AI consultant not only understands how to use AI in a variety of ways, they understand business processes, teams, and policies, and can help business leaders identify bottlenecks, deficiencies, and inefficiencies. Those are the challenges in a business that must be addressed, and adept consultants will then recommend specific applications of AI, whether generative AI or specific AI-powered tools, which can solve those challenges.

Once solutions have been identified that align with business goals, AI consulting then goes further and helps with implementation which, more often than not, consists of essential team training. It is only through AI literacy that businesses are able to truly implement AI and achieve real ROI from their efforts.

2. How do AI consulting and training services help companies create a culture of AI-driven innovation ?

The beauty of AI technology is that, once someone fully grasps what's possible and begins to apply AI solutions to their work, it's like a dam is opened within their mind and they'll see more and more opportunities. Whether that's helping with routine tasks like drafting emails or generating stock images, or more advanced workflows and automation.

The problem with many businesses today is that, while there may be several individuals in the organization learning about AI, they're doing it on their own, in silos. They aren't receiving training - in fact, just 34% of early career professionals reported receiving training in a recent survey - and they aren't actively participating in the sharing of knowledge internally. This results in inconsistent application and advancement of AI solutions, with the majority of employees being left behind. This not only impacts them negatively individually, it also represents a tremendous loss of opportunity for the business.

However, when adequate training and AI consulting are brought to the fore, not only does every employee within the organization benefit from directed learning about AI and familiarity with AI's potential, it creates an exponential effect of AI-driven innovation. As each individual learns and applies and innovates within their own circle of influence, and those innovations are shared with the rest of the organization through meetings or internal communication channels, it spurs ideas in others, invites improvements, and fosters collaboration.

For instance, when I shared with my team my process for building out new podcast interviews, the step-by-step set of custom instructions I had programmed my AI assistant to walk through, even though no one else is podcasting they learned how to build custom instructions and that it was possible to create a collaborative workflow with an AI.

3. What role does AI play in decision-making and business strategy, and how can employees adapt to this shift ?

AI itself can become an invaluable consultant and assistant, particularly for decision-making and business strategy, once someone has initial training and familiarity with core concepts like prompt engineering. Imagine having access to a paid consultant 24/7, there to answer any question and brainstorm any topic, and one who is entirely familiar with you, your business, your industry, your audience, and even your personal goals and challenges.

All it takes is an understanding of how AI works, how to customize a particular large language model (LLM) like ChatGPT or Gemini, and what information to provide it. Once done, the user has an AI assistant... kinda like a work buddy... who knows all about you and your role and what you're trying to accomplish. Which means that you can jump into a new chat and rather than trying to craft the perfect prompt that has all the context and AI might need, you can just get right to the core of what you want to talk about.

I turn to my AI Chief of Staff multiple times a day with questions ranging from simple email responses or social posts, all the way up to long term business strategy and advice - something that's critical for solopreneurs, but also anyone in any role where they lack a mentor or confidant. Just as organization-wide AI literacy can help propel an entire business, empowering everyone in your organization to have an AI strategist at their beck and call can be transformative. To help, I created a free set of instructions and prompt that anyone can use to build their own AI Work Buddy, with an optional course and community they can leverage if needed.

4. How can small and mid-sized businesses leverage AI without significant infrastructure investment ?

SMB owners should focus on all of the ways that their entire teams can leverage the LLMs before pursuing implementing new AI-powered tools and solutions. In fact, every organization that is already paying for Google Workspace has access to Gemini Advanced and should make sure every employee in the organization is trained on how to use Gemini and how to take advantage of the AI that's already integrated into so many of their other apps, like Gmail, Google Drive, and so on.

With Gemini, teams can take advantage of Deep Research to have the AI scan and summarize dozens and dozens of websites to research whatever topics are of interest. This is terrific for content creation of course, but also think about how such an application can power competitive research, market research, product research, and general business strategies. They can also use NotebookLM to create a repository of company documents and information that can then be easily summarized and questioned without having to read through hundreds of pages of PDFs, and without concern for hallucinations. And teams can share prompts and ideas for Gems (Gemini's custom instructions) which anyone can use to automate and improve whatever processes they're working on.

Businesses who aren't already paying for Google can, of course, invest in ChatGPT or Anthropic's Claude for low monthly fees, even for entire teams, giving everyone access to incredible AI capabilities.

Those are the major "closed" and premium LLMs. There are also "open" LLMs like Llama which businesses can consider, so long as there's at least one individual in the organization familiar enough with open source AI to understand how to install, configure, and make available such a company-wide solution. This approach is ideal for organizations that want to leverage AI for conversations and use-cases that might require access to sensitive or private information, such as custom records or financial data, which should never be shared with an LLM like ChatGPT.

If an SMB never implemented another AI solution, and even if the existing LLMs stopped improving and iterating, company-wide adoption of "basic" AI like ChatGPT or Gemini would still advance the company's efficiency and capability tremendously.

5. How can businesses ensure ethical and responsible AI use while scaling their AI initiatives ? 

When it comes to ethical and responsible AI usage, there are several factors to keep in mind, and how applicable each of these are depends on the business and use-case. 

a. Transparency - While we're in the midst of this AI Revolution, there are still qualms and concerns in some sectors and scenarios about the use of AI, so instances where AI is being used to generate information or take actions that are externally focused should be 100% transparent about their use of AI. This can include marketing, sales, customer support, services, and more.

b. Bias - Because AI models were trained on existing data and information that existed on the internet, there exists tremendous bias. This is most commonly seen in content where women and minorities are dramatically underrepresented and therefore must be accounted for. Beyond that, businesses need to be aware of the potential for bias in data and not rely on AI-powered conclusions without first considering how those conclusions were reached and whether they were unduly influenced. A basic example might be if you were to provide your AI with a month's worth of website traffic and ask for an analysis on your audience, without telling the AI that you paid for a Meta ad for 7 days that drove an unusual amount of traffic from EMEA. The AI would come to the incorrect conclusion that your business is growing in that region.

c. Copyright - Today's laws do not protect the copyright of AI-generated content of any kind, though they're moving in that direction. Which means if you use AI to create an ebook for your business, or on behalf of a client, that work may not be protected. Businesses must be mindful of this and ensure that if a piece needs to be protected by copyright law, it cannot be wholly created by AI.

Most importantly, it is imperative that business owners adopt a policy of company-wide AI literacy and provide adequate training. Not only can this help ensure responsible AI use by all, it also helps ensure that every individual in the organization is afforded the opportunity to upskill with AI and protect their career.

6. How does AI training empower employees to work more efficiently rather than fear automation ? 

That is the underlying concern today, isn't it? That AI will take my job or your job. And while there has been a lot of hype and debate on both sides of that argument in recent years, the truth is simple: some jobs and tasks will no longer need to be done by humans. Some roles and careers will be replaced by AI, whether that's AI-powered systems or AI-equipped employees who simply perform the same tasks faster or better than non-AI using employees once did.

The World Economic Forum predicted that by 2030, 92 million jobs would be displaced by AI, and that 170 million new jobs would be created. Governments and Big Tech were happy to see more than 78 million new jobs could be created, but that still means 92 million people need to upskill or reskill.

Just as with every past Industrial Revolution, this AI Revolution will result in some jobs simply no longer being needed, but the good news is, AI as a technology and skill is one that anyone can adopt and learn. Because Generative AI is conversational, one doesn't have to have a PhD to leverage it. Far from it, in fact.

With a basic level of AI literacy, any employee can use AI and discover ways that it can make them more efficient in their role and more productive for their companies. They can also then envision tasks they were doing which AI can do today, and other or even new tasks they're now freed up to focus on. Because, let's be honest... we all have tasks or aspects of our job which are boring, mundane, and repetitive. Why not figure out how to hand most or all of those tasks over to an AI system to handle while we then have more time in our day to think strategically or re-focus on the more creative and interesting aspects of our job?

Rather than being overwhelmed with countless mindless tickets, let AI automate the most repetitive customer support queries and give your staff more time to spend with high level customers and complex problems.

Rather than wasting time emailing status updates and meeting notes, let AI handle that while your team focuses on actually moving projects forward and doing the necessary work.

Rather than mindlessly clicking back and forth through countless websites trying to find answers to an obscure question, just ask AI for the answer and source, then move on with your day.

AI can be incredibly empowering and enlightening for every member of every organization. The first step is to educate each employee on what AI can do and what it represents to them, and their role. That's why AI literacy and training should be a top priority for every business today.