EP 214: KPMG Leader's Secrets of Balancing AI Innovation and Ethics

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When we talk about using artificial intelligence, there's no limit to what businesses can do, but there probably should be some limits on how it gets implemented, right, because innovation in AI can happen so fast. But there's ethical considerations that we have to keep in mind, and we're going to be talking about that today and more on Everyday AI. Thanks for joining us. My name is Jordan Wilson. I am your host of Everyday AI and this show's for you. Right? This is a daily live stream, podcast and free daily newsletter helping everyday people like you and me not just learn generative AI, but how we can all actually leverage it to grow our companies and to grow our careers. So some days you get just me, some days you get an amazing guest who's helping other companies push AI forward in the workforce. So that's today. We have a guest. But before we bring on our guests and talk about this, let's do as we do every day. Let's go over the AI news. And as a reminder, if you are joining us live, please go to your everyday AI.com Sign up for our free daily newsletter. And if you're on the podcast, we always leave, you know, those links and and more notes in the description for each episode. So make sure you go sign up for the free daily newsletter. And I tell people it's literally like a generative AI university. We have now more than 200 episodes. You can go watch at any time, Cat, like by category. Right. And read every single newsletter that I've written. Yes. A human former journalist, I write the newsletters, not AI. All right, so let's talk about what's going on in the world of AI news. So Stable Diffusion 3 has been released. So Stability AI just announced their next generation model, Stable Diffusion 3, claiming it will improve quality and accuracy with multiple subject prompts. So stable diffusion 3 promises more accurate text incorporation within generated images, setting it apart from its predecessor. This obviously comes after rival company OpenAI released their new new AI video model, Sora, which also does images. And it also raises the concern for the potential for fake videos. Right.

Deepfakes.

It's all the talk now, especially with the election here in the us but both companies are taking steps to prevent misuse of their tools and we'll be working with experts before publicly releasing them. All right, so speaking about things that haven't been publicly released yet, Apple is building a Secret AI tool according to reports. All right, so the new one here, Apple has apparently quietly released a generative AI tool called Ask for.

It's.

It's called Ask. All right, so they've released it. It's called Ask and it is for its Apple Care support advisors and it's expected to be a key feature in the upcoming iOS 18 and iPhone 16 releases. So this tool right now is for employees to provide faster technical support by generating responses to customer queries from Apple's internal support database. So Apple's new AI tool, Ask, it's just currently only available to a select group of AppleCare advisors, but it is expected to be rolled out to more employees soon. So I'm guessing this is the precursor of what all end users may ultimately be using. You know, when the new iOS updates or when Apple announces its Gen AI offering, that is WWDC conference in June. Last but not least, sad news. If you listen to the everyday AI show, you know I love Chat GPT plugins. Well, they are officially gone. Well, they officially have a death date, right? So I've been talking about this for months. We've known that they were going to get phased out, but Chat GP or OpenAI just released this. But they are announcing, they just announced on the website they are winding down plugins and so new conversations with plugins will be disabled on March 19th. So you can no longer start a new conversation with ChatGPT plugins on March 19 and your current conversations with plugins will no longer work after April 9th. All right, so no new plugin conversations March 19th and your current ones won't work after April 9th. Sad day. And hey, we're going to have to update our free Prime Prompt Polish PPP course because a lot of it's based on plugins.

So.

So all right, that's going to take a little three week off break while we revamp it. All right, you didn't come here to hear me talk about plugins. You probably came to hear about the ethical consideration of AI and strategic vision. So I'm excited for today's conversation. I, I love talking with leaders in the consulting industry and that's who we have today. So please help me. Welcome to the show. Bring him on.

There we go.

All right, Kelly Dowd. Kelly is the senior, is a senior consultant and at the Innovation lab at kpmg. Kelly, thank you for joining the show.

Thank you so much J for having me. This is a great show and I'm so happy to be here.

All right, I'm excited. So Kelly, before We dive into it. And before we talk about how you can use AI for more personalized experiences and ethical consideration and all that, tell us a little bit about what, I mean, what you do at kpmg.

Yeah. Thank you so much. First of all, I just want to say everything I'm going to say here is just for my personal opinion and it's not a representation of my firm, kpmg. So, yes, I'm Kelly Dyod. I'm a Nigerian American based out of Washington, D.C. and what I do for the firm is really to help our clients think differently. You might wonder, what do you mean by think differently? So we help our clients reevaluate their current products, their services, their process, and think of what are the strategic initiatives that they can take to improve all of this product or services or processes or what are those net new ideas that they might be thinking about. And as you know, with AI here down on our fingertips, we can generate millions and millions of ideas. Right. So it's just a gold mine for everyone. However, we just have to think about, okay, what are those ethical considerations, what are those privacy laws that we are not thinking about on a daily basis, but we, we have to pay attention to because they are complex and of course we don't want lawsuit. Right. So we have to think about the length of breadth of others. So, and, and as we go on in this conversation, I would deep dive into all of these critical experts. So thanks for having me again.

Oh, no, absolutely. All right, so we got that. Yeah, I get sometimes, you know, if you work in the big companies, you can't talk through the companies.

We get it.

So we're just talking to Kelly, Kelly today and his personal experience. So if you are joining us live, make sure to get your, your, your questions in for Kelly. So, I mean, what do you want to know about strategic innovation and AI and how we can balance it? But, you know, Kelly, like, one thing I'm, I'm curious about with, with, with your personal experience, you know, so you talked about, you know, a big part of what you do is, is helping companies reimagine, right? What can be possible with AI? Like, I'm curious because I think that sometimes it's hard for companies to, to think with, you know, a technology so impactful as generative AI. What's been your experience so far with this? I mean, are, do you think, in general companies, is it very hard for them to change their ways of thinking that maybe has helped them, you know, grow, you know, in, in the previous decades?

That's a beautiful question. And you know, I'll. First of all, let me, let me, let me just put this out there too. So when you think about change, it's not something that is easy at all, right? We all love that process of transformation. But to take the leap of faith, right, to engage in the transformation, it's not something that we enjoy. I mean, some people get a trip, for example. Yes. I love the drill of just trying to like, change things around, right? The same thing. It is because a lot of people love to assess what they have been used to. So when you are rolling out new innovation, when you are rolling on new ideas, new technology for people to use, you are actually tapping into that strength, power of like, okay, you have to relearn a new tool. And which is something that we've really seen across the board, you know, from clients to even employees as well. So it possesses this challenge of, okay, when is the right time for me to take the leap? Or when is the time to like, sit back? I mean, Jordan and the audience, look, AI, it's not, it's not a new concept. It's been in existence for a while. But what makes it new, what makes it so like a shining object, is the fact that generative AI is here and it's actually disrupted the industry. And frankly, if you don't jump on the bandwagon, you are really lagging behind. And I'll give you a pro primary example here. Look at what happened with COVID No one saw Covid coming. I mean, some people might have said, okay, there might be a pandemic that, that will be coming, but however, we were not prepared at all. No one was prepared for it. And look at what happened. A lot of companies, you know, closed because they didn't think about, okay, what are the new ways? What are those ways that we can be thinking about serving our clients? Well, we were all, we were all at home for almost a year, more than a year. And a lot of companies even come back to business at all. Take for example, small, you know, small size businesses, they had a lot of impact, right, on Kybic. Because if you, if you look at it from this perspective as well, bring it back to the food, to the food and beverage industry. The restaurants, some restaurant were like, okay, this has happened. People are trapped at home, they need to be fed. We need to stay in business, right? We need to continue growing and things like that. So how can we do this? Some businesses went into this whole mode of, okay, I will, I will do a curbside pickup or I would do a delivery service. And as you know, Jordan, the companies that didn't go through the process of thinking creatively or just, just expanding the idea or trying new things, right, Those are the companies that actually close or failed. I'll use the word fail because for every century there's always a huge transformation that come. But when the transformation come, I mean, even the technology transformation that happened, right? And here we are again, advanced technology and what is to come. But we can actually use AI perhaps to think about what is to come.

Yeah. So many like Kelly, I love how you, you know, kind of compared it to, you know, a pandemic. No one sees a pandemic coming. But when it does come, I mean, you, you have to change, right? You have to change your daily life. And it does change you, you know, from that point forward. Indeed, you know, with that in mind, you know, for, for the companies that you're working with at kpmg, you know, do you think that they've kind of already made that, that shift when it comes to generative AI? Like, have they looked at it and they're like, okay, we have to change the way that we do business moving forward? Have you already seen that? Or do you think that there's still some hesitation? Are companies still like, ah, we're not sure about how this, you know, generative AI or how these large language models are going to impact the industry.

Beautiful question. And look at us again, right? If you think about the direction at what we're heading and the timeline at which AI, generative AI came to play is still relatively new. So because of that, we have seen consistently companies trying to take a step back, to reassess, to reevaluate, to just at least to even think strategically where they are heading to. They have to rethink their vision, their mission, their purpose. And most importantly, is AI just a shining object that we will use and it will just fall to the side and we will be like, okay, what is next? So, so because of that, a lot of companies are taking a very careful consideration in adopting AI as, you know, right? To just give you a public example of some of the companies that have adopted AI. Take for example, Patagonia Sustainable Initiative Strategy. I mean, that is one. I mean, you can also think about IBM's Watson for Oncology, right? So that is another company that I've seen the importance of AI and actually taking AI and wove it into the medical system. So also, I believe Unilever's AI Fair for hiring. That is another critical initiative that was actually Rollout too. That really helps to foster this best hiring thinking about, okay, when we are trying to hire employees and all, what are the ways that we can be equitable, we can diversify and we can make sure that we have the right talents. Because at the end of the day, the right talents that are needed will be able to implement whatever description that they've been given. If they are not right for the job, then they will struggle with. The struggle comes with perhaps potential turnover. And also the struggles bring even the companies spending more money on training. And each and every company wants to be deeply effective and minimize cost as much as possible. So companies right now are thinking strategically and they are taking one step at the head. In my, in my focus, I will say that will happen one day. We'll have a lot of company adopting AI. But for now, people are still taking a very, very careful consideration when it comes to AI adoption.

I'm curious about that because obviously, you know, you're working with, with companies of all sizes, right? You know, probably small or medium and then some of the largest companies in the world, right. So I'm curious, like I've, I've always said, you know, for, you know, especially like small and medium sized businesses, maybe they, they have a little more agility and they can take generative AI on a little more wholeheartedly and, and maybe even quicker. What are some, you know, and this, this goes to a question here from Harvey. So thanks for, thanks for asking this Harvey. He just says, what are some of the top tips that you usually share with others? So yeah, if a company is ready and maybe they are a little more agile and they say, hey, we can implement this this month. What are some of the top tips that you might share?

Well, that's a beautiful question and I would try to be very, very careful here. So I don't give everything. I'm joking. So frankly speaking, when, when, when a company is trying to go to the process of adopting any AI technology, I would say one of the top things that comes to mind is customer centric approach. Because at the end of the day, you need to think critically about your end user. You need to think about your customer, you need to think about your stakeholders. So just take that stakeholder centric approach. I don't know how familiar people are with the whole concept of stakeholder centric approach because with that it really helps you so think deep into each and every stakeholder that you serve. We're talking about the internal stakeholder, we're talking about the external stakeholder because the Interesting thing that a lot of people don't, that we've seen, I don't pay critical attention to is the internal stakeholder, your internal stakeholders. You're talking about your employees, right? You're talking about your board, you're talking about all of the people, the people that actually roll up their sleeves on a daily basis to do the work for you, you know, that really push the organization forward, that think deep. So you have to think about that. So and the third party clients that you have that actually provide you some of the resources that help you to be able to like deliver to your clients, think about those people as well. And most importantly, your main clients that you serve. So that is your whole stakeholder centric approach. You have to think about it in a 360 degree way of evaluating all the people that you serve, the people that really help you, that bring your products life. The other part too that a lot of companies can think about, and this is something that we've seen out there that really helps is transparency and communication. You know, when you are trying to adopt technology like this, make people understand the critical impact, make people understand the critical value and make people understand the process it would take. So take for example, if normally it takes you two weeks, right, to ship out on information, it takes you two weeks to get things done, to deliver to your clients. And now with a process like this, you will do it within, let's say three days, right? You have to communicate that to your clients. And you, frankly speaking, you have to be transparent as well. Because the truth is, if you're not, then there is that expectation of misalignment because your customer are already like thinking, well, I will get this in two weeks. So I'm gonna travel to Dubai. By the time I'm back from Dubai, should be hot, it should be here. But no, it's already three days. Then it's arrived, it's sitting outside, the rain comes, then destroyed the product. It's a shipping package or something. So you have to, that is just a very, very small example to bring this home. Just think about it from the perspective of, okay, your communication. You can never over communicate when it comes to anything that will help you preventing, in my opinion, lawsuit, right? So your customer, things like that. So you just have to really communicate and try as much as possible to be transparent. Think about communicating the data that you collect to your customers. Well, what is the purpose of the data? Why are you collecting this data? What for? Right? Because at the end of the day you really need to be careful about the current data loss. Right. That governs consumer privacy too, and personal usage of items. So the other thing that you can think about as well is collaboration and partnership. So you can try to collaborate with let's say regulatory bodies, right, or let's say people that are deeply involved in AI technology. So what are the things that am I missing? What are the oversight, what are the labs? Right. What are the things that are my blind spot that perhaps I'm not thinking about, but you are the expert in this domain, you're the expert in the industry. So then last but not the least is just think about building an ethical framework and governance. Building an ethical framework and governance would definitely help you to think about the holistic approach of adopting AI.

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There's so much, so much good information there, Kelly. Like I'm over here just typing notes, right? I've done this show like 200 plus times. I'm like, this is, this is gold, y'.

All.

Like, if you're listening, I hope you're enjoying this as much as as I am. So one thing I wanted to pull out there, Kelly, that I love that you brought up is over communicating, right? And you have to have, you know, when you talk about ethical considerations, one of the biggest things is open and transparent communication, right? Like one thing, I just had a conversation with our attorney, you know, for my company and she said, hey, you know, we're going to be using AI in this, this, in this way. Normally it would take this, we're going to be billing you for this. And I'm like, okay, I appreciate that communication, right? But I do want to get to one point here, Kelly, that we haven't talked a lot about, and that's the future of what AI can allow us to do, right? So when we talk about strategic innovation, I think AI can really help us with personalization. Can you talk a little bit maybe, about, you know, what you've seen in that space or maybe how companies can use AI to even increase the personalization that they offer their customers or clients?

Yes. And I will use Sephora as a primary example here, because Sephora is one of the leading giants, right, in the beauty industry. And Sephora actually implemented an AI system that really helps their customers to identify what shade of lipstick, what shade of item that they need that is perfect for them. Because you have to think about it from the perspective of, okay, who are my clients? Who are these customers that I'm trying to serve, Right? What is their socioeconomic background? And what is. What is even the ratio background? Because at the end of the day, you have to think deeply about each and every part of this. Right. Of your implementation strategy, because the people, okay, how much they have to spend. Think about it. Because, again, you want to make profit, but at the same time, you want to ensure that your customers can afford your product. So that is one. Then think about the racial diversity of your customers. Sephora did this perfectly well because you can say, oh, for example, I mean, of course, I'm obviously black and I'm, like, so proud of it, right? But if I go get a makeup, for example, and it's not a shade of my skin, right? And if I apply it, my gi. You come a Dorito or burrito, however you want to. You want to call me, right? Because you think, well, I mean, the apple doesn't match the oranges and things like that, because it doesn't. It's not coherent, cohesive, and it doesn't look the same. So Sephora is leading in this arena of, like, okay, trying to use AI to create a more personalized experience for their customer. Because at the end of the day, you need to lay more emphasis on that experience. Every person here wants something that is bespoke, that is tailored to them. I mean, and also, it doesn't have to be really expensive. It could just be a little up that you change your business model that make your customers feels like, okay, this is about me. This is my product. This was made for me. I'm snacking it out of the chef.

That's Kelly, that's such a good example, right? It's, it's tangible. It's something you can hold in your hands, you know, like a company like Sephora using generative AI to better match, you know, their, their end customers, you know, with a shade of makeup that might better, you know, fit their skin tone or maybe a look that they're going for. But you know, I guess the downside of more data and more personalization and just more AI is more concerns about privacy and ethics. So how can companies balance that? Because it is so powerful and I think we're living in this sweet age of we have so much data, right? Until Google maybe finally gets rid of cookies in 2024. So we have this like sweet spot where we have so much data, so much power. With generative AI, how can companies balance it ethically with privacy and keeping that trust?

That's a beautiful question, and I didn't anticipate this question. I. Just kidding. So one of the things companies can do really is they need to respect consumer privacy. Brand must navigate like complex data protection regulations that are out there. Right. Think about the GDPR in Europe. Read. I, I would, I will encourage every person listening to this. Try to read. If you're trying to go into the field of AI or adopting AI as a whole for your personal or for your business, for your company as well. Just think about the navigating the complex data structures and protections and regulations that are out there. So the GDPR in Europe will really help you. The CCPA in California as well will really, really help you to give you more insight into, okay, what are the things that I can do and what are the things that I shouldn't do? What should I stay up from? And also it will give consumer more control of their personal data because at the end of the day I don't want my data to be going to a company that I don't know anything about and I don't know what it would be using the data for. So as you are, John, and I'm sure you're really, really concerned about your personal data. You will, you, you'll, you're trying to like fill out a form online to join a site and they're asking you for all of this data. Like, okay, what is your data? But that is very common. I'm just going to throw something very, very silly out there. What do you do before you go to bed at night? It's none of your business. Well, I may, maybe you need it to perhaps create something that is tailored right for Me for my sleeping partner and things like that. So you have to communicate the reason why you need that data and where is that data going to? So you have to be careful. Again, back to the over communication. You cannot do wrong by over communicating the need for those data. Think about it. So try to find a way that you can give consumers control of their personal data and adopt privacy by design principles as well. So just think about when you collect data, process the data, try to use a more transparent and secure way of, you know, like displaying the data or even making the case for why you need the data. And again, Sephora did a great job of this, right? They personalized their beauty product. They also informed their consumers how their data be used. And last but not the least like get, they give their consumers control over the data privacy too. So it's like, well, I'm gonna really help you to find the product that best match your skin. But I will tell you why I am doing it this way. And the most important thing is you have control over your data. So don't worry, I'm not gonna like police your data. I'm not just gonna like take it and put it in the data bank and woof, it's gone. No. So Sephora have done a great job, right, of helping clients to find, find that right product. And I say communicating to them why it is essential and most importantly, giving them the power to own their data.

So, so like just the concept again of over communicating both up front and on the back end. Kelly, that's, that's great advice for any leader, any company out there. All right, so before we land this plane, we got a couple quick questions. We'll see if we can go through them kind of, kind of rapid fire style so we can get in from the audience here. So question here, so asking how and sorry, I don't know if it's cow or chow. So how do you help clients using AI? Like is it just do they come to you with a software or do they come with you and say, hey, we need to save time. How do companies normally come and work with you?

Yeah, that's a beautiful question. And Kai, thanks for asking the question. So one of the things that we do really is we do this assessment, right? I would say we maturity assessments to understand the current state of the client's business and where they're heading to, which will be the potential future state. So with that is we're able to like advise the clients the right time to adopt AI. Right. And the most important thing as well is okay, when you adopt in this AI, what can you use this AI for? It's not. Then how can you prompt? Right. How can you generate what about the data to the data that you need to feed? Are you going to be using a public domain, going to be using public chargeability or do you need to like create your own specific company GPT that utilizes your data? Right. Why you're also connected to the cloud so you have to think about it that way. So we advise our, I mean one of the things that we just said to client is trying to understand the current state, right. And perhaps the potential future state where they're heading to. So with that we'll be able to like devise the best AI strategy to adapt.

Great. All right, so here we go from Rolando. Great question saying Kelly, do you see certain industries more open to using AI for innovation?

That's a beautiful question. I would say yes. Right. I mean right now almost all industries are joining into the bandwagon of adopting AI and using it for innovation. So take for example the tech industry. As you know they already there's AI everywhere, Google, Apple, right. Even your, even your WhatsApp has AI. So there's AI everywhere now you can use it and they also like, they also platforms out there that you can download from your app store to, to be able to like use AI on your personal phone as well to generate those emails. Right. Those ideas, those innovation, innovative thoughts, just newsletter and things like that. So the other thing too that, that we've seen is, we've seen, seen the healthcare industry adopting more AI centric approach as well. I mean of course they are merging it with customer centric because at the end of the day the patient confers like okay, what are the ways they can utilize AI to enhance the life of a patient? So the other industry that we are seeing is, I mean aerospace is coming on. Aerospace, Aerospace and, and defense. Yes, yes, yes. Which is really great. And I will say it's my anticipation that I hope that the government will, you know, will be on the plane soon to join us in the whole, you know, let me use the word quest for ethical use of AI. And so, so and last but not the least the fashion industry, which is the industry that actually came from before consulting because I was a fashion model and you know, before and I know it's time so when I'm going to like go into all of that. So maybe that for another time. But the fashion industry, a billion dollar industry is actually leveraging AI right now. Ralph Lauren, you know, doing a Lot Balenciaga as well, leveraging AI. So we have seen things out there and companies are joining, I would say as swift as possible, but with careful consideration.

All right. Yeah, you better be careful there. Talking too much about fashion. We might have to hire you on, you know, to help the everyday AI team team here a little better, you know, going live every day. So. All right, there's, there's so many questions. We can't get to them all. I'm sorry. But I, I do have to ask as we wrap up here, Kelly, what is your one biggest takeaway for, for companies out there? Maybe, you know, you're speaking to a business owner right now who has a medium sized company and they've been, you know, kind of on the fence, right. They, they want to be able to innovate with AI, but they, they really do care about the ethical implications. What is that best piece of advice that you have for that person out there that can help them really leverage AI, but do it in a responsible and ethical way?

That's a beautiful question. And all I will say is when you are not sure about adopting AI or not. So think about personalization and your customer experience. Think about that. So if you are all about your customers, if you're taking a customer centric approach, right, then perhaps an AI adoption might be the right way for you to go. However, should you decide that you want to go into that realm, think about the ethical use of data and think about privacy concern. All of those are critical and they will really help you in the long run. And the last, but not the lesson I would say is over communicate.

There's no, no better. Like I've always thought that over communication on AI is important. But Kelly, through your examples today, and you've shared like five or six use cases, the value that you've delivered In a short 32 minutes has been astounding. Thank you, Kelly Dowd, senior consultant at the Innovation Lab at kpmg. Kelly, thank you so much for joining the Everyday AI show and sharing your insights with our audience. We appreciate it.

Thank you so much. Thanks for having me and have a good day.

All right. Absolutely. Hey everyone, if you did get as much value as I did, make sure if this was helpful. Please share this post with your friends. Maybe tag them if you're here on social media. But also join us Monday. All right, Every single Monday we Talk about the AI news that matters. Please go to your everyday AI.com Sign up for the free daily newsletter because Kelly just dropped a lot of knowledge. It's all going to be in there. Thank you for joining. We'll see you back next week and every day for more Everyday AI. Thanks, y'.

All.

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