18 February 2021
Los Angeles, CA
Alyssa Cotrina, Beyond Limits
 
Artificial intelligence isn’t just some vague, figurative ideation contributing to movie plots anymore. It is a very real, tangible technological necessity for the majority of today’s most critical industries. To remain competitive, companies, industries, governments, and entire countries are realizing the need for enterprise-grade AI that can support them in their efforts to deliver to their bottom-lines and keep up with the ever-accelerating road of technological evolution.
 
 
 
 
The Challenges to Enterprise AI Adoption
 
Unfortunately, potholes and roadblocks can hinder the path of progress and often present themselves in the form of adoption and implementation. In the summer of 2020, Hydrocarbon Processing hosted the International Refining & Petroleum Conference Americas. On the second day of the conference, there was a panel discussion on digitalization where Joe McMullen of AVEVA Value Chain Optimization Marketing listed off a few contributing hurdles around the adoption of artificial intelligence including:
 
+ Technology Adoption
Due to a lack of cultural buy-in from internal personnel, the solution’s goal is often misunderstood and thus goes unused, resulting in the inability of the technology to prove its ultimate value.
 
+ Challenge Identification
Unrealistic expectations exist around technology having the ability to solve a problem without that problem actually being understood before attempting to implement the technology.
 
+ Technology Integration
The technology is hindered from proving its ultimate value when entities seeking to implement AI don’t do their due diligence in pursuing vendors that won’t disappear after supplying the technology. Issues arise when a company is forced to move forward without access to an AI software vendor that will continue to work with the company on its digital transformation journey. 
 
McMullen’s astute observations serve as an outline that helps us focus on some of the core issues surrounding AI implementation such as building trust in the technology, identifying a solution advanced enough to work with limited, misleading or missing data, and empowering teams to perpetuate a digital-ready, innovation-minded company culture.
 
 
The Keys to Enterprise AI Adoption
 
Fortunately, a majority of the challenges reported by McMullen are made trivial when the right AI solution presents itself. When tackling the issue of adoption, the leading factor comes down to picking an enterprise-grade AI company that possesses the vital keys and features necessary to facilitate implementation including:
 
+ Explainable AI that lives outside a black box
 
Explainable AI is essential for detailing recommendations in a clear manner with transparent information, evidence, uncertainty, confidence and risk, which can be understood by people and interpreted by machines. All of this boils down to the most important factor in successful artificial intelligence adoption and implementation: trust. The value of an AI systems’ functionality may be measured in terms of usability that results in increased efficiency, decreased waste, or accelerated time-to-decision. The ultimate value lies in delivering everyday decision-makers with actionable intelligence so they make faster, more accurate decisions that pique their confidence.
 
Keeping humans in the loop via explainable AI is a vital key to developing a symbiotic relationship, grounded in trust, with the technology and fortifying confidence in its results. Explainable, glass box artificial intelligence solutions can be found in systems that provide human-understandable, traceable, and adaptable audit trails for their recommendations. All of this clarity and transparency leads to more inherent, cultural buy-in and utilization from relevant personnel.
 
+ Cognitive AI – The most advanced form of the technology currently on the market
 
 
 
 
Clean data is always ideal, yet often allusive. Cognitive AI systems can both consume and organize unstructured data, analytics, and other essential information. Moreover, this advanced technological innovation can work with limited, misleading, or missing data by combining the best of conventional numeric AI approaches and advanced symbolic AI techniques to deliver reasoning and intelligence that emulates human intuition.
 
Cognitive AI can codify expert knowledge, expertise, experience, and best practices – then disseminate that data across every level of an entire organization. This capability is instrumental to unlock the value in seemingly un-quantifiable data. Human-inspired knowledge bases empower the system to compare recommended courses of action against best practices developed by people, enabling the system to also become smarter over time as it continues learning from new data, inputs, and influences. This facilitation of increased and streamlined access to expert information that’s readily recognized by industry professionals sustains trust in the system.
 
+ An AI readiness program at the ready
 
“A digital-ready company culture must exist with an innovation-minded team that’s empowered to implement structural transitions kicked into high gear by the adoption of AI technology. It’s vital this culture places importance on data-driven decision-making instead of defaulting to legacy approaches. This is where your AI investment will either thrive or fall flat.” –AJ Abdallat, Forbes
 
Any great enterprise-grade AI software company will come with a readiness program to help both identify the main operation problem that needs to be solved as well as support that company along on its digital transformation journey. Selecting such an AI company that sticks around to ensure a seamless transition by working on the ground directly (in tandem) with the software’s users will help ensure correct implementation of the technology. AI engineers should be training everyday decision-makers on how to properly use the solution while simultaneously learning whether the UI/UX is practical for any user’s day-to-day purposes.
 
Cultivating a digital attitude by diving into innovative technology and including personnel at every level, while building on their abilities and defining an AI outlook at the outset, are important aspects. Involving every stakeholder with a clear angle on success will inspire implementation efforts.
 
 
 
 
“This is a very exciting time for Beyond Limits to gain such a valuable partner as The Carnrite Group. Through Carnrite’s vast network, we hope to provide valuable guidance and increase awareness of the benefits of AI in critical sectors, including boosting operational insights, improving operating conditions, and ultimately, increase adoption of this next generation technology.” –AJ Abdallat, Beyond Limits & The Carnrite Group Press Release
 
 
The Outlook for Enterprise AI Adoption
 
As of now AI is almost everywhere and contributing to almost everything. From energy to utilities, natural resources, healthcare, and other evolving markets, artificial intelligence solutions are spearheading the trail when it comes to companies outlining their digital transformation strategies. Adoption and implementation may seem like the most daunting challenges but partnering with the right enterprise-grade AI company is key to lighting that path forward and beyond.
 
 
WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT ENTERPRISE AI THAT’S EASY TO ADOPT? TAKE A LOOK AT OUR TECH HERE.