The rise of the computer and the assembly line created new anxieties concerning the future of work, employment, and man’s role throughout the 19th century. Today, the introduction of different forms of automation powered by artificial intelligence continues to create new anxieties like those of the 19th century. For SMBs, these new fears include losing their competitive edge and relinquishing market shares to the competition.
The need to stay ahead of the competition has led approximately 34% of SMBs to embrace AI in some form, and this percentage is expected to increase to 65% by 2028. Despite the increased adoption of AI, SMB decision-makers say they struggle to leverage it to realize business goals. Here, the common challenges will be outlined with tips on eliminating them.
5 Reasons Why SMBs Struggle with Integrating or Adopting AI to Optimize Processes
- Data Availability and Quality – AI algorithms and neural networks (NN) require large amounts of quality data sets to learn, relearn, and provide accurate insight or take specific actions. Although adopting digital transformation technologies has helped reduce the challenges of capturing data, the quality of data captured is unsatisfactory. Most SMBs say that 60% of the data they capture stays as dark data. This is due to the data quality and businesses not knowing what to do with captured data. Consequently, feeding unstructured data to AI and NN systems will produce no results.
- Challenges with Expertise—Although AI as a Service (AIaaS) is fast becoming a thing, experts are still required to determine training parameters, build custom solutions to fit specific use cases, understand proprietary AI stacks, and troubleshoot AI systems during their applications. Relying on open-source solutions is more likely to produce generic solutions to complex answers, while using established AI frameworks still requires some technical expertise. Finding talented AI experts remains challenging, and there is an estimated shortage of approximately 15 million AI professionals who can meet today’s needs.
- Cost Considerations – The overhead cost for developing, implementing, and managing an AI strategy or system includes hiring experts, developing the system from scratch or subscribing to an AIaaS provider. Generally, the cost of building a custom-built AI system starts from $35,000. These costs do not consider the management and training costs of developing a high-performing AI system. For the average SMB, the cost of adopting AI systems or AI-powered solutions remains high, which is more than the operational budgets of most SMBs.
- Restructuring Your Workforce—Approximately 69% of college graduates fear AI will take their jobs or reduce their earning ability. Without reassurance, this fear may translate into actions to sabotage AI systems and limit their effectiveness. Hence, ensuring the poor performance of integrated AI-powered solutions forces decision-makers to ditch them.
- The Fear of Cyberattacks—60% of SMBs view generative AI as an opportunity to optimize their business processes but fear its cyber risks. This fear isn’t unfounded. Successful data breaches put 70% of small and medium-sized enterprises out of business as hackers and bad actors increasingly adopt AI to commit cyber fraud; business owners are right to be concerned.
No Risks, No Rewards
A business will not progress without taking calculated risks, and integrating generative AI and neural networks is a risk worth taking. The insight AI provides and its automation capabilities optimize business processes. The Economist expects AI to increase productivity, translating into a generation of approximately $ 4.4 trillion in the world’s economy. A PWC research agrees with this analysis and expects generative AI to drive 45% of global economic gains by 2030. This means SMBs cannot ignore generative AI. So, here are the tips to successfully integrate AI and to deal with the associated challenges.
- Improving in-house Capabilities—SMBs have diverse options for dealing with any skillset challenges. These options include using established AIaaS tools to integrate AI systems within business processes. Many of these options provide full stacks or packages that are easy to use or implement to simplify specific tasks. Although many AIaaS services come at a particular cost, they cover responsibilities such as managing the AI system, maintaining it, automating updates, and securing against cyberattacks. Relying on AIaaS enables SMBs to test AI solutions without committing limited financial resources to white elephant projects.
- Defining Your Peculiar Use Case – Defining how your team or business processes should use generative AI and the specific tasks it intends to automate reduces the challenges with data quality. Clearly defined goals ensure accurate or focused data collection for your AI systems. These goals also bring clarity to critical employees who may be concerned about AI replacing their roles within your organization. Reassuring your workforce will ensure employees work simultaneously with generative AI to improve productivity.
- Working with Experts – Approximately 83% of SMBs rely on outsourcing specific business services to address skill gap challenges and improve existing processes. As a business manager or owner, you should view the integration of generative AI as one more business service you could outsource to simplify specific tasks such as digital marketing, customer support, and IT services. AI experts or managed service providers have the tools, skillsets, and industry-specific expertise to simplify your AI adoption drive. Of course, vetting the service provider's capabilities through referrals, scrutinizing work portfolios, and customer feedback checks are required.
Leverage Generative AI and Reap Rewards
Nothing worth having comes easy. Adopting AI and navigating through the challenges of its implementation is a risk worth taking to reduce operational costs and maximize profit in the long run. Like most technological advancements, advances in the application of generative AI also mean that plug-and-play AI solutions are closer than you think. Hence, your business will soon be able to purchase an AI system and deploy it without any extensive configuration. We encourage SMBs to get started today as it ensures that employees get comfortable with AI and stay prepared to leverage its considerable benefits.