Applied AI

What’s included.

Choose a focused use case with clear information boundaries and a person responsible for reviewing the result.

• Use-case assessment: define the task, suitable inputs, success criteria, and limits.
• Knowledge preparation: organize approved source material and access responsibilities.
• Assisted workflows: explore drafting, summarization, information retrieval, or document support.
• Human review: test representative examples, document limitations, and define when people must check or reject the output.

Where this helps.

• Staff spend time locating information across approved documents.
• A repetitive first draft can be reviewed by a knowledgeable person.
• Long material needs an initial summary with source checking.
• A team needs a controlled pilot before wider adoption.

Illustrative project: an internal knowledge assistant.

Problem: Staff repeatedly search several policy documents to answer routine questions.

Solution: Test an assistant against a defined set of approved documents, with source references and a clear escalation path.

Intended outcome: Faster initial retrieval while staff remain responsible for checking accuracy. This is a hypothetical example, not a client result.

Start with a bounded pilot.

Bring one repeatable information task and examples of acceptable output. AI can make mistakes; sensitive information, platform settings, permitted use, and human review must be agreed before deployment.

What your team takes away.

• A defined use case, approved information sources, and a named business owner.
• A set of representative questions or documents for evaluating the pilot.
• Review criteria for accuracy, source quality, and appropriate use.
• A handover covering access, known limitations, and the next decision.

From a useful idea to a controlled pilot.

1. Choose one task. Start with a repeatable problem where a person can judge whether the output is useful.
2. Prepare the information. Confirm source ownership, access permissions, retention needs, and the platform settings before connecting data.
3. Test real variations. Include incomplete inputs, ambiguous questions, and cases where the assistant should say it does not know.
4. Review before expanding. Compare results with the original task and decide whether to improve, adopt, or stop the pilot.

Questions about applied AI.

Do we need to move all our documents first?

No. A first project can use a small, approved set of documents. The source material should be relevant, current, and accessible only to the intended users.

Can an assistant make decisions or send responses automatically?

The starting point is assistance with a human review step. Any action that changes records, sends a message, or affects a customer needs separately agreed permissions, controls, and testing.

Are AI subscriptions included?

Platform subscriptions, usage charges, and implementation are identified separately in the proposal. The right option depends on the task, users, information, and existing licenses.

What does a successful pilot look like?

Agree on useful output before building: for example, finding the correct source, producing a reviewable draft, and flagging missing information. Evaluate representative examples rather than relying on a polished demonstration.

Bring one task worth improving.

Describe the work, who does it, and what a useful result looks like. Start with a Technology & Workflow Review or discuss an AI pilot.

Choose a first AI project you can evaluate

Start with one task and one defined output: summarizing an approved document set, preparing a draft for review, or locating information in a controlled knowledge library. Decide what a useful answer looks like before choosing the tool.

Build a practical pilot scorecard

• Source quality: which documents are approved, current, and available to the intended user?
• Accuracy: can a reviewer check the answer against the source, including cases where information is missing?
• Access: does the setup respect the permissions and information boundaries required for the task?
• Review effort: how long does correction and approval take compared with the current process?
• Failure handling: when should the assistant stop, flag uncertainty, or send the work to a person?

Test representative examples and difficult cases before expanding a pilot. Record the tool, source set, test conditions, and review results so later changes can be compared fairly.

What affects an AI implementation budget?

Source cleanup, integrations, permissions, evaluation, subscriptions, and ongoing ownership all affect scope. Begin with a bounded pilot and an explicit decision to continue, revise, or stop. Do not assume that a convincing demonstration proves production readiness.

Plan a useful first AI project, explore workflow automation, or discuss a focused technology review.