Storytelling is one of the most effective tools for supporting AI change within an organization. Sharing real examples of how people have successfully leveraged artificial intelligence to improve processes and drive innovation can humanize shifts, inspire others, and help to address fears.
One of the most underutilized tactics in artificial intelligence change initiatives? Storytelling. Sharing stories about your early successes and experiments with AI can make the work feel more human, show how change can happen responsibly and thoughtfully — and provide inspiration to help people to accept new ways of thinking and working.
I'm often surprised by the number of interesting stories about AI-driven evolutions that remain hidden and unheard within an organization.
I recently was a speaker at an artificial intelligence event on this topic, and afterwards, an engineer came up to me. She had used Claude 3 to improve a workflow for a tedious quote process that had required a lot of resources. Her work reduced the time the team had to spend on that process from weeks to hours — and they loved it because they could now spend time on more strategic business tasks. I asked who else had heard this story. The answer? Only the people inside of her group.
Her experience carefully integrating artificial intelligence to her team’s work, how she carefully considered data privacy and security, and worked closely with end users to deliver more value to customers is a great example for others to follow and model. And it was an inspiring case of grassroots innovative work in support of the company's strategic goals to improve customer service. It was a story that needed sharing.
Stories work because we relate to them emotionally. Seek out, thoughtfully capture, and share the stories happening in your organization.
Show how the work supports your strategic goals. Use it to model thoughtful behavior. Share what was challenging in the journey, and use this as a learning opportunity on responsible AI, data privacy, security and governance.
If your digging uncovers issues that need fixing, see that as a good thing — you've learned something crucial. Then, develop a well-designed process for dealing with those issues, which can become part of the ongoing story and learning.
For ages, marketers have used stories and examples to make the obscure possible feel real and to motivate people to take action. The difficult — and unique — challenges of artificial intelligence transformation require rethinking how we motivate change. Stories are a great way to celebrate and recognize successes. But there is so much more they can do. Capturing and sharing stories makes abstract change feel more concrete for employees, helps them understand and visualize how they can get involved, and can help to assuage fears and doubts.
Alison McCauley is an artificial intelligence keynote speaker and executive advisor focusing on the human dimensions of AI.