The conversation around artificial intelligence in the larger world talks about endless possibilities and true intelligence—once a far-off dream. In business, of course, the conversation is more focused on big questions like “How can this help us?”, “What are the advantages over what we do today?” and “How will this improve the customer experience?”
The answer depends on the business, as AI can bridge gaps and fill cracks in areas of expertise and process flows that will be unique to your company. But what is truly clear, looking across the businesses eager to take advantage of the AI gold rush, is that too many are answering those questions with “we’ll figure it out later” and rushing headlong into using the technology.
That’s natural, given how exciting AI is and the obvious ways it can streamline processes and save time and even money. But it’s a disservice to the teams using AI if it’s not easy and intuitive to do so, and it underscores the challenges around AI.
AI Is Being Widely Used, but Perhaps Not Effectively
A late 2024 Capitol One report found that 87% of survey respondents were confident in their organization’s AI capabilities, but scratching the surface tells a slightly different story.
In that same study, Forbes notes that only 35% of businesses have a strong data culture that would make that possible. The adage “garbage in, garbage out” still holds true when it relates to data and AI. In addition, Forbes wrote that only 35% of tech practitioners believe their organizations have the necessary skills and expertise to implement complex AI projects.
This quote from the linked article above, from author Deborah Perry Piscione, makes it clear that 98% of executives who feel they must incorporate AI are potentially just throwing money after something that is not being effectively rolled out.
“The stark reality is that most employees lack the technical skills to effectively use AI tools, while leadership teams often push ahead without clear strategic direction. This has created a dangerous disconnect where expensive AI systems gather dust or, worse, generate unreliable outputs that erode trust,” Piscione pointed out.
How can businesses embrace this technology in a way that works, then? I’ll give you a recent example from right here at Bottomline.
Data to Help Decision-Making and Action
Within our Paymode network, over 550,000 businesses make and receive payments, which means tracking all our customers is a big task. That’s especially true when those clients can use different payment types, membership levels, and business relationships that create complex layers and webs of data.
The ask for Bottomline’s data science team was to provide insight and reduce that complexity in one specific aspect: Assist customer-facing teams in predicting when customers are likely to change their accepted payment types or membership levels. This proactive approach enables teams to connect with customers and engage in constructive conversations about any potential changes. A simple task on paper made incredibly complex by the data involved, the sheer number of businesses, and the need to build trust in the results with the customer-facing employees who need to take meaningful action.
“You can give data scientists a request, and they’ll make magic happen, but if we do this isolated from business users and experts, the results may not be understandable or trusted by the people who need to use them,” said Vinay Khosla, Bottomline’s Director of Product Data and Analytics. “We always work very closely with internal stakeholders to verify the business-usefulness of the results and build their business knowledge and expertise into our models. This approach ensures the output of the AI is clear, shows the reasons behind the results, and suggests appropriate actions to take. This gives the customer-facing team confidence in the output and enables them to effectively communicate with customers.”
By demystifying AI, it becomes a valuable tool driving better business outcomes. The output of the prediction model flows into an easy-to-use dashboard that the relevant teams can use. I liken it to a jigsaw puzzle, where you open the box and see all the pieces without understanding how they fit together to make a beautiful picture. Instead of offering a thousand pieces of data to sort through to help predict when a customer may be making a significant account change, the dashboard delivers the key data points and recommended actions. The user sees the completed jigsaw and can make informed decisions.
For example, a customer that has been receiving an increasing number of Premium ACH and virtual card payments to draw down their check stack may be looking to switch solely to Premium ACH across their entire stack of 50 network payers. A support representative can see that immediately and make a call to offer to help.
Bottomline has a range of AI-driven initiatives, that demonstrate our ongoing commitment to innovative technology. One of these initiatives aims to simplify vendor enrollment onto the Paymode network, making the process more straightforward, intuitive, and secure. This approach makes it easier for customers to enroll and entrust their data to Bottomline and enables our internal teams to offer support if needed.
Khosla makes it clear that the way forward for AI in business is about taking complex data, making it simple and straightforward, and working with business experts to build vital business knowledge. This path ensures the results are useful for anyone in the organization. Basically, lots of completed jigsaws. Anything less could mean adoption is slow or even non-existent.
“Ultimately, AI’s potential is sky-high if we can make it something our organization is excited to use. It’s my job to ensure what we’re delivering to our teams is something that says ‘okay, here’s what’s happening with X customer, here’s the step you may want to take’ so they’re not spending the time sifting through data to figure that out,” Khosla said. “We’re well on our way to making AI part of the day-to-day fabric of this company, and if we do that right, everyone from our employees to our partners and clients will benefit.”
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