On the subject of presenting at occasions like SAS Innovate on Tour, it’s by no means only a one-way road.
Regardless of what number of nations I go to, what number of instances I click on by way of my slides, or how typically I communicate to a room full of people that love expertise, I all the time be taught simply as a lot from the viewers as I hope they be taught from me.
At this yr’s Innovate on Tour, my keynote was about how generative AI (GenAI) – in addition to a few of SAS’s newer applied sciences – helps you be extra productive. This has clearly been a giant yr for AI, and chatting with audiences gave me a possibility to inform prospects (and potential prospects) what SAS has been as much as in that house.
Considered one of my favourite issues, although, is when keynotes flip into conversations. So, on that observe, listed here are a couple of insights that I shared with audiences all around the world – and some that I introduced again with me.
Here is three issues I shared with audiences:
1. SAS is not only speaking about what’s doable with GenAI. We’re doing.
Whereas some organizations speak about how they plan to implement GenAI in the future, SAS has a number of choices at present utilizing it.
However.
GenAI received’t resolve all our issues. In actual fact, it could possibly trigger them too. Which leads me to the following factor I shared…
2. GenAI offers us extra of all the things. However generally extra turns into an excessive amount of.
GenAI makes you extremely environment friendly, providing you with extra of all the things: extra questions, extra information, extra code, extra fashions, extra solutions. However the draw back is that extra can get out of hand until you’ve got the best processes, instruments or governance in place.
Consider it like an meeting line. You begin with information after which wrangle it with code. As soon as your information is prepared you construct fashions, then you definately deploy these fashions into the enterprise – which hopefully leads to solutions or selections.
However when the speed of manufacturing will increase resulting from utilizing generative AI, all the things else additionally will increase. With out the best instruments to deal with the additional productiveness, issues pile up, work will get delayed and alternatives are missed – as a result of there’s nothing to assist handle the chaos.
In fact, that is the place SAS® Viya® is available in. Viya helps you handle information, construct fashions and achieve insights from these fashions. It absorbs your surplus productiveness and manages it extra.
3. Not solely does SAS Viya handle the extra – so do different new SAS applied sciences.
That is the enjoyable half as a result of we have now a deep bench of merchandise that use GenAI that can assist you be extra productive. Take SAS® Knowledge Maker, which covers the primary a part of our meeting line by producing artificial information that’s statistically congruent with actual information in a low-code, no-code setting. Or SAS Viya Workbench, our cloud-native, cloud-scalable improvement setting that allows you to spin up a improvement setting in seconds. After which there’s SAS App Manufacturing unit and SAS Viya Copilot. All of them assist handle the extra.
I additionally realized fairly a bit, too. Here is three issues the tour taught me:
1. On the subject of AI, some individuals have found that it could possibly overpromise – and underdeliver.
Let’s chalk this one as much as hype versus actuality. Regardless of a (legitimate) sense of AI pleasure, some individuals aren’t but seeing the ROIs they’d hoped for. They’ve obtained lots of demos and proof-of-concepts (PoCs) going, however not lots of precise issues deployed of their enterprise that ship actual enterprise worth.
This sentiment got here up a couple of instances throughout our travels. Right here’s my takeaway: After we’re speaking about AI, whether or not on stage or in private conversations, it’s vital to maintain expectations in verify and keep targeted on delivering precise enterprise worth.
2. The most effective communication occurs in particular person (or, to place it one other method: relationships matter).
As a part of my position in R&D I attempt to prioritize good communication, whether or not meaning scheduling an impromptu Groups chat or sending out common newsletters. However even an awesome Microsoft Groups chat can’t examine to an precise face-to-face, pull-up-a-chair, nice-to-see-you dialog. It’s simple to overlook this after we get busy in our routines, however I’m all the time (pleasantly) reminded after I do occasions like Innovate on Tour. It’s a possibility to not simply discuss however to be taught.
3. Touring to a number of nations is exhausting, however filled with probably the most surprising surprises.
This one’s powerful to articulate, so let me attempt to set the stage. Taking part in Innovate on Tour entails lengthy hours, loopy jet lag, and the problem of maintaining with work whereas adjusting to new time zones. However simply because the exhaustion units in, one thing occurs that jogs my memory of how grateful I’m to have these experiences.
Like, for instance, seeing our assist staff at work fixing each drawback that cropped up. Or attending a networking occasion the place balloons helped us observe the whereabouts of our executives (it’s a must to see it to consider it). Or getting a small dose of various cultures that helps me higher perceive the each day lives of our international groups. It’s protected to say that I come residence exhausted, however exhilarated. Pleased with our staff, pleased with our merchandise, pleased with SAS. (However able to get again to my very own workplace.)
