I am not a big fan of the term ‘Artificial Intelligence’ because I really don’t believe what we see today can be truly be classified a ‘intelligence’ but for the sake of consistency I will run with the pack and use the terminology that is out there already.
Clearly, there is a lot of hype in and around AI. It permeates businesses from the smallest to the largest. The thing that we do know for sure is that no one can predict with certainly where the future lies. Honestly, this AI wave seems to be a lot like the cloud computing wave back in the early 2000’s. If this AI stuff follows the predictable historical pattern then my guess is that 2025 will see the peak of inflated expectations as most providers of AI try and generate real ROI for their AI investment dollars.
This, of course, doesn’t mean that AI is going away. However, I do feel that we will see greater ‘real world’ incorporation of AI into everyday business. I came across an idea that I believe will hold true in 2025 that every entity will soon have it’s own AI agent that will act of its behalf. This means individuals, businesses, brands, etc will have their own autonomous AI agents that will conduct business and manage things automatically and intelligently.
This shift to a world full of AI, to me, is a very similar to what I saw with the move to the cloud as I said. That means that in the long term AI is simply going to be a part of the technology landscape and we’ll take it for granted now as we do with using apps on our phone connected just about anywhere to our data. However, while we are still in the growth phase this represents a business opportunity I would suggest.
I was lucky enough to understand the change that cloud computing would bring to the landscape almost 20 years ago now and I see much the same opportunity today. You have to parse you way through the hype and drill down into the business benefits, but I do see them in the not to distant future for just about every business. The starting point I would suggest is to deepen your understanding about not only the technology but also its impact, especially what problems it will solve.
As always, education is the key and I have been doing my best to educate myself. So far I would suggest the following book as the best I have come across so far:
The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the Twenty-first Century’s Greatest Dilemma – Mustafa Suleyman,
Michael Bhaskar
and this interview with Mustafa as well, who in fact is now the AI CEO for Microsoft!
Mustafa Suleyman on the coming wave of AI
Unfortunately, as with the move to the cloud back all those years ago, I’m again seeing a hesitancy by SMB IT professionals, MSPs and technology providers from adding AI to their portfolio of skills and services. This, I feel will place them at a great disadvantage as the wave gathers momentum. It is much easier to ride in front of the wave than trying to paddle and catch it. Independent of any bet on the technology, looking at it in pure business terms, I would suggest it is largely green fields and if few are taking advantage then it is generally a risk that is well worthwhile. It is rare that you make good money doing what everyone does. Thus, doing what few are doing is probably the path to greater profitability I would suggest.
It seems to me that most SMB technology providers are most comfortable when they are doing what all their peers are doing. This leads to a commoditisation of these services are there is little differentiation between what different providers offer. I would suggest that you don’t need to throw away everything that you are doing today, however you should take a pragmatic approach and determine what is the least profitable part of your MSP business and stop doing that and replace with something few due, such as AI. We all know that to maximise returns, you should review your portfolio regularly and sell the loss makers. There is also room in most portfolios for an amount of risk. Not 100%, but a certain amount to potentially reap larger rewards. Was Bitcoin a risk back 10 – 15 years ago? Sure, but good judgement would have told you not to bet your house on it. However, a small amount of capital invested in this risk asset would have paid extremely handsome dividends today. As the old adage says ‘you need to speculate to accumulate’.
As I said, education is key and in many cases for traditional MSPs this will also mean a pivot from purely hardware, infrastructure and licenses to using code to solve problems. Luckily, there is an abundance of training and tools to be taken advantage of, with many being free. It is never too late to learn if you have the desire. However, desire without discipline is dreaming. Discipline is planning. Discipline is consistency. Discipline is the differentiator that will separate those who benefit from the AI and those that will again fall behind and struggle to keep up with change as it accelerates even faster than it did with the shift to the cloud.
Success is a journey. It is hard work but importantly it is achievable with nothing more than discipline. You have can give yourself more chance of success by supporting disciple with process, planning and review. If it is challenging for your business to adopt AI and pivot, then it will be the same for every other business. That should inspire you because it means if you can make it happen, then most will not because they fear that same challenge and will not take action. The funny thing is that the action required is generally far less onerous that you think once you actually get started. Overcoming the initial inertia is what keep most people rooted in place. Overcome that initial inertia and you are well on the way, and in fact I would suggest it will be mostly downhill from there. The trick is, just get started.
Fate provides us all with opportunities to succeed. Most procrastinate and say they will be ‘ready’ to begin tomorrow and thus it passed them by because fate waits for no one. You need to make yourself ready for the opportunity that something like AI provides. That comes with commitment and discipline as well as risk of course, but in my books it is a risk well worth taking because standing still is falling behind when it comes to technology. I have seen it before and the chances are that it will play out in a similar way. No one knows for certain but what you do for sure is give yourself the best chance of taking advantage of that opportunity through something as simple as education.
It seems clear that, like the cloud, AI will make the technology landscape a very different place in a few years. However, the question is, will you and your business still be the same as it is now? The answer to that, I would suggest, will determine your success.
CIAOPS 