Unlocking operational leverage is the name of the game for today’s businesses.
In the face of ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, controlling for what is controllable while making the most of available resources is emerging as a way to capture growth.
For instance, Amazon is equipping its finance teams with generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools designed to support and evolve legacy workflows across areas such as fraud detection, contract review, financial forecasting, personal productivity, interpretation of rules and regulations and tax-related work, per a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report.
The tech giant is just one firm of many that are leveraging AI to transform back-office operations.
After all, it makes sense that the Big Tech firms responsible for developing AI would want to streamline their internal workflows and embrace improved efficiency and enhanced decision-making with the same AI innovations they are investing into and partnering with.
But it doesn’t mean that the “Magnificent Seven” are the only enterprises able to tap AI to give existing and traditional processes and business functions a shot in the arm.
No matter where the world may fall on the AI hype cycle, as the technology continues to evolve and access further democratizes, its integration into internal workflows will likely become even more sophisticated and widespread as companies look to focus on areas like improving productivity, automating processes and modernizing the customer experience.
Read more: 5 Trends These AI Experts Think Could Change Payments and Commerce
From streamlining back-office processes to enhancing decision-making capabilities, AI is unlocking operational leverage as companies harness the technology to create value by transforming internal workflows.
“The ChatGPT light bulb went off in everybody’s head, and it brought artificial intelligence and state-of-the-art deep learning into the public discourse,” Andy Hock, senior vice president of product and strategy at Cerebras, told PYMNTS. “And from an enterprise standpoint, a light bulb went off in the heads of many Fortune 1000 CIOs and CTOs, too.”
One of the most immediate benefits of AI in enterprise settings is the automation of repetitive and mundane tasks. Robotic Process Automation (RPA), combined with AI, enables organizations to handle high-volume, repetitive tasks more efficiently and accurately than human labor. These tasks include data entry, invoice processing, payroll management and routine administrative duties.
New PYMNTS Intelligence in the June report “SMBs Race to Critical Mass on AI Usage” found that 96% of small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) that have tried AI tools see it as an effective method to streamline tasks.
And a new report from venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz finds that the use of AI within accounting can revolutionize traditionally tedious tasks like bookkeeping, tax preparation and auditing.
It isn’t just accounting where AI can shine — marketing functions are also getting a lift from the innovation. Additional PYMNTS Intelligence data in “The 2024 CAIO Report: Are CMOs Missing GenAI’s Potential?” reveals that nearly four in five chief marketing officers (CMOs) consider GenAI to be very or extremely important to providing a positive customer experience.
Three-quarters of CMOs also consider GenAI very important for conducting market research, indicating a strong focus on understanding consumer behavior. Half of surveyed CMOs already use GenAI for routine tasks like drafting emails and visualizing data.
Read more: AI’s Essential Use Cases Across B2B Operations
The integration of AI into enterprise workflows is not just a technological advancement but a strategic imperative for modern businesses.
“I’ve been in the artificial intelligence and machine learning (ML) space for more than 20 years now,” Yoav Amiel, chief information officer at freight brokerage platform and third-party logistics company RXO, told PYMNTS. “When we build technology, we’re not building it just for its own sake, we build technology to help the business.”
By doing things like automating repetitive tasks, enhancing data analytics, improving customer service, streamlining HR processes, strengthening financial management, optimizing supply chains and fortifying cybersecurity, AI is enabling corporations to capture significant value creation.
For example, with the integration of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Apple products will soon be able to handle customer inquiries, process orders and even provide product recommendations, while at JPMorgan Chase, getting trained in AI is now part of being hired.
Morgan Stanley said this past September that it was launching an AI-powered assistant for financial advisers and their support staff, and Salesforce has said that its AI + Data + CRM platform has been instrumental in much of its recent growth.
PYMNTS Intelligence finds that the corporate treasury function is another area where AI can shine.
“Companies need to adopt new technology,” Claudia Villasis-Wallraff, head of data driven treasury at Deutsche Bank, told PYMNTS. “And with this, I not only mean adopting API connectivity, but also cloud functions and artificial intelligence.”
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