In a development that could shock absolutely no one who has ever interacted with technology for more than five minutes, a growing number of corporate executives are quietly learning that artificial intelligence is not, in fact, the sorcerous solution to every complex business problem. Instead, several once-bright eyed CEOs are now waking up to the sobering reality that AI is roughly as effective at solving their problems as a motivational poster is at actually motivating anyone.
The Wall Street Journal reports that companies which went all in on generative AI are now gently treading backwards toward more traditional solutions, in much the same way one retreats from a suspiciously glowing vending machine. Many of these organizations, having boasted about their AI strategies just last quarter, are now cheekily rebranding their efforts as pilot programs or “exploratory phases,” which is corporate-speak for “we are still trying to make this thing work without breaking our entire operation.”
For example, retail darling Walmart ventured into AI territory hoping to make employees’ lives easier, only to discover that rolling out untested technology into a mega-sized workflow is not always the shortcut to utopia. In some cases, the result was less streamlined innovation and more expensive chaos with a digital accent.
Other companies have met similarly deflating results, such as Air Canada’s chat bot which memorably invented a refund policy and got its employer taken to court. A delight for consumers, slightly less delightful for the legal department.
On Wall Street, where tech buzzwords tend to circulate faster than actual returns, investor patience is showing signs of fraying. Analysts are now casting a skeptical eye on firms that promised AI-generated gold but delivered mostly confusion and a small army of hallucinating chatbots. Some companies, rather than admit overreach, have resorted to what could be described as strategic vagueness, offering updates so noncommittal they might as well be posted on a dating app profile.
Amid all this, the actual pioneers of generative AI, such as OpenAI and Google, are still soldiering on, quietly racking up GPU time while the rest of the corporate world scratches its head and wonders why their chatbot refuses to stop quoting 1990s sitcoms.
To sum up: the AI revolution is still very much alive, but for now it is looking less like a lightning-fast corporate savior and more like that intern who promises big things and then spends three weeks trying to figure out how the printer works.
Turns out, even robots cannot save you from a bad business strategy.