Breaking down the latest in AI, customer service, and technology — so you don’t have to.
FRONT-END DEVELOPMENTS
🖤 WE’RE LOVING: AI outsmarts customer frustration, CSAT on the upswing 🔮 WE’LL SEE: Altman’s “Intelligence Age” — game-changer or digital snake oil? ⚠️ SAY LESS:CX data gathering dust while execs play psychic
BACK-END BREAKDOWN
AI isn’t a job jeopardizer, it’s the ultimate work wingman
The AI adoption rate is crushing the pace of previous technologies, with 40% of working-age Americans already using generative AI tools. While many workers still fear replacement, visionaries like McKinsey's Lareina Yee argue that AI is the key to unlocking greater purpose and joy at work.
🔢 SEMANTICS
70% of employees say their sense of purpose is defined by work, and Yee believes gen AI can help
Yee asserts that gen AI will actually allow us to replace mundane tasks, freeing us up to foster human connections and invest in personal growth
AI also frees up time to connect with coworkers or invest in our skills, training, and network, making us better at our jobs
📈 SENTIMENT ANALYSIS
Forget the doomsday predictions — AI isn't here to steal your job, it's here to supercharge it. By offloading the mundane, AI gives us the opportunity to flex our uniquely human muscles: creativity, empathy, and strategic thinking.
People are embracing AI customer service — CX leaders exhale
This month brings good tidings on the customer service front. Customer satisfaction is finally improving (thanks to AI) and reports show that consumers are growing increasingly comfortable with the shift to an AI customer service approach.
🔢 SEMANTICS
In the past two years, customer satisfaction scores have improved for 63% of U.S. businesses
Half of consumers believe AI has improved customer service, and 3 in 5 believe the technology will continue to improve customer service in the future
Younger generations are more optimistic about the future of AI in customer service, particularly those between the ages of 25 and 34
📈 SENTIMENT ANALYSIS
Are people finally ready to accept that AI and humans can coexist to deliver better customer service? We’d love to see the nonbelievers wave a white flag, but proving them wrong gives us purpose. Onwards!
VENN ZERO
As customers get cozy with AI agents handling their routine tasks, businesses are seeing their investment in AI pay off big time. It's a match made in digital heaven.
The fear of letting go is sabotaging how we use AI at work
Early in my career, I’d sometimes see a dozen printed-out emails stacked on the corner of an executive’s desk. It was a telltale sign that they had a different relationship with technology than I did. But it told me something else, too: that holding too tight onto old patterns of work is the surest way to hamper your productivity.
I don’t see those email stacks today. But I’ve noticed a far greater problem. The same lack of trust in new technology keeps many of us from making the most of our AI tools.
There are whole categories of work that AI can take off our hands if we let it. In fact, a full one-third of our current work lives could be automated by 2030. Yet, we still waste countless hours transcribing meeting notes and composing pro forma emails. And too often, we freeze when there’s a chance to hand real responsibilities over to an AI.
I believe that technical hurdles aren’t what’s holding us back. The true blocker is something much more basic, even primal. It’s our fear of letting go.
This doesn’t just apply to customer service, either. I’m talking about a transformation that’s needed across every part of the customer journey. The companies truly maximizing returns on this technology are getting their AI out of first gear. Here's how.
“[AI] has time for you. It acknowledges you. It has a brain. It’s polite. It can almost always answer your question because there’s only so many questions that get asked with any regularity, and it has the data to answer the question. It’s the perfect way to run customer interactions rather than using humans who can speak unclearly, don’t really understand you, are impatient and are just plain exhausted.” – Jim Cramer, Host of “Mad Money”, CNBC