AI in companies: opportunities, use cases, and challenges

Many leaders and professionals today are faced with the question of how AI can actually be applied in their own company’s context — and are concerned that by not acting, they may miss the opportunity. Artificial Intelligence has already revolutionized many industries. The good news is: we can learn a lot from these applications. In this article, we look at areas where AI can deliver tangible results for different stakeholders — from the internal automation of routine tasks to the creation of new, customer-centric products and services.

Introduction: The relevance of AI in companies

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a decisive factor for business success. Companies that effectively use AI technologies can achieve significant advantages, including improved efficiency, increased innovation capacity, and a stronger market position.

On the other hand, failing to adopt AI can lead to a significant competitive disadvantage. AI offers the opportunity to turn data into valuable insights, automate processes, and create personalized customer experiences. Companies that do not seize these opportunities risk being overtaken by more agile and technologically advanced competitors.

Benefits of AI in companies at a glance

Let’s begin by understanding what AI can fundamentally do for companies — and what it can’t. Artificial intelligence brings benefits to companies in the key areas of efficiency, savings, customer focus, and decision-making.

AI can increase efficiency and relieve employees

AI systems can process large amounts of data faster than humans. This leads to increased efficiency in processes and can significantly boost productivity. For example, many financial service providers use AI to quickly analyze loan applications, reducing processing time and increasing customer satisfaction.

AI can save resources

Employees often spend a lot of time digging for information manually, which can be incredibly frustrating.

Both employees, out of intrinsic motivation, and companies themselves want to free up unproductive time and invest it in truly important and meaningful activities.

AI can take over this search and significantly speed it up. This not only saves time but also keeps employees’ morale high.

AI can improve customer experiences

Through the use of AI, companies can create personalized experiences for their customers. Whether through personalized marketing messages or tailored recommendations in retail, AI enables companies to respond to individual customer needs and strengthen customer loyalty.

AI can assist in decision-making

AI technologies can analyze complex data and recognize patterns that are not immediately obvious to the human eye. This ability supports companies in decision-making by providing more accurate predictions and deeper insights.

Challenges of AI in companies

The challenges of AI primarily lie in the areas of implementation, associated decisions, costs, and competencies.

• Cost: Implementing AI requires financial resources, which can be a hurdle, especially for smaller companies.
• Lack of expertise: There is often a shortage of qualified professionals who can develop and implement AI systems. When purchasing external expertise, this challenge turns into a question of financial resources.
• Data quality and availability: AI requires large amounts of high-quality data, which is often difficult to access or incomplete.
• Integration into existing systems: Seamlessly integrating AI into existing IT infrastructures is often complex and time-consuming. However, AI can also serve as a bridge between different systems.
• Ethical and legal issues: The use of AI raises concerns regarding data protection, transparency, and accountability.

Capabilities and possibilities of AI

One can imagine AI as a superhero sent to handle tasks that we ourselves would struggle with.

Extracting information from various file formats

Teams often store valuable content in file formats such as images and Excel files that cannot be found by conventional search functions.

Employees want to be able to find and use information regardless of the file format — whether it’s in a JPG or XLS file.

AI can extract such information. This allows even bulky content from large Excel files to be accessed in just a few seconds.

AI can break folder structures

Employees often don’t remember where they’ve saved documents or information, leading to long search times. The information overload becomes unmanageable.

Employees want information to be accessible, regardless of folder structures.

AI can do that. Based on semantic search, AI can now find information independently of location and language used.

AI can break down communication barriers and overcome information silos

Companies often use important documents with complicated phrasing or technical jargon that not everyone understands.

Companies want complicated content to be easier to understand and presented in simplified language. Employees also have an interest in avoiding misunderstandings caused by complicated language.

AI can not only translate content accurately but also simplify it and present it in a way that makes it understandable to non-experts.

Industries

In principle, AI can be used in any industry to provide support. Industries that particularly benefit from Artificial Intelligence include:

AI in practice: Use cases of AI

Below, we look at some concrete areas where companies can efficiently implement AI solutions. We focus on the possibilities for both the company as a whole and for individual employees.

AI in project management

Synergies instead of duplication

Employees often do duplicate work because different stakeholders aren’t aware of existing content or someone else is already working on the same task. This wastes valuable time and is frustrating for everyone involved.

Companies want to build on existing knowledge and give employees the certainty that their contribution is found and used.

AI can help reduce such duplication: When reliable information is provided about what already exists, work can focus on new things.

With AI, it becomes possible to build on existing projects.

Employees often don’t know whether they already have information on a particular topic/project. They want to immediately know if information is available and build upon it.

AI can make this possible. Project information can now be found more easily than ever, and Q&A solutions can be used to query them. This can serve as a basis for continuing the project or further developing it.

→ To the case study: AI solutions for the construction sector

AI in knowledge management

Through the wave of retirements and employee turnover, companies lose valuable knowledge that is only stored in the minds of employees. However, they often don’t know in advance which knowledge is undocumented. And when key internal contacts are gone, the link to stored knowledge is often broken — the knowledge may still exist, but no one knows where it is.

Companies have a significant interest in identifying undocumented knowledge early so they can fill in the gaps and prepare well for the departure of employees.

AI can help uncover knowledge gaps early and work with relevant parties to fill them. Thanks to its analytical capabilities, AI systems can recognize topics that are insufficiently documented, highlight them, and assist in their expansion.

→ To the case study with BRZ

AI in customer service and content management

Companies regularly lose leads because they don’t have direct access to high-quality content. Or employees spend a lot of time manually preparing and forwarding information.

Companies are keen to enable customers to find the information that matters to them on their own on the website (Helpdesk, blog, etc.).

Artificial intelligence in customer service can significantly help guide potential leads more efficiently through the sales funnel. It can assist with content management by consolidating important information and making it easily queryable.

→ To the case study: improving citizen experience

AI in HR – Recruiting and onboarding

New employees often have many questions about various areas but don’t know where to find the information or whom to ask. This can make onboarding a very time-consuming process.

Companies, on the other hand, want employees to be able to find answers to their questions anytime during onboarding, regardless of whether they already know their contact person.

By providing employees with managed access to company knowledge, AI can significantly speed up the onboarding process.

→ To the case study: recruiting assistant RABE

AI in security management

AI can recognize threats in real-time, detect anomalies in network traffic, and take proactive security measures. It supports the analysis of large datasets and helps identify cyberattacks early.

→ To the case study: AI in IT security

The limits of AI in companies

AI, in its current development stage, has limits in certain areas: creativity, empathy, relationship-building, ethics and morals, as well as self-monitoring.

• AI cannot be creative or independently develop new ideas, as these are human traits.
• AI systems lack empathy and the ability to understand complex human emotions, which can be problematic in customer-facing roles.
• They cannot make ethical decisions and are dependent on the moral guidelines of their programming.
• Additionally, AI cannot replicate the interpersonal relationship dynamics that are crucial in many business and personal interactions.
• Finally, the use of AI requires continuous monitoring and adjustment by humans to avoid poor decision-making and flawed analyses.

These limits make it clear that AI can never replace humans but should rather be seen as a tool to assist humans.

Implementing AI

The introduction of AI into companies is a strategic process that requires careful planning and targeted implementation. First, business goals must be clearly defined to determine how AI can support them.

Selecting the right AI technologies is crucial and should be accompanied by an analysis of the available data landscape and internal resources. Pilot projects offer a good opportunity to gather initial experiences and test the technology on a small scale.

Training and educating employees is also important to foster acceptance and competence in dealing with AI.

→ More about the implementation of AIStrategy and Insights

Summary

Artificial Intelligence offers companies valuable opportunities — from relieving existing employees, speeding up the onboarding of new talent, to providing better services and products for customers.

However, AI also presents significant challenges, such as those concerning data protection and security, as well as budgetary considerations. To successfully utilize AI, companies should develop a clear strategy that incorporates both technical and personal/social considerations.