Richard Wood on why certified AI skills matter more than ever to consultants

Richard Wood leads the RAI Centre Programme, working in partnership with universities and consultancies to deliver certified AI training that equips organisations and leaders with practical, accredited skills for long-term transformation. In an exclusive interview with the London Keynote Speakers Agency, he shares where organisations should begin with AI adoption, the most common leadership pitfalls, and how consultancies and their clients can directly connect AI strategy to growth, profit and performance.

From your experience working with organisations at different stages of growth, where should companies realistically begin their AI adoption journey?

So that’s a really interesting question. I think at right at the start, companies really need to maybe take into account what type of organisation they are, because no one size fits all with many things in life, never mind AI.

So, I would very much be, you know, talking to companies and senior teams and, you know, the people that are running the organisation and say, what type of organisation are we and what are our priorities?

Because that’s a really good start point then for then the next step, which in my opinion would then be finding someone or an organisation that’s got knowledge and expertise in that area around AI adoption, but very much connected to where we are now.

So, I think for teams it would be find someone that’s coming from that standpoint of what type of an organisation are we and what might our priorities be, because the priorities for a company that’s been going 12 months and maybe have got a couple of team members is going to be so different from an organisation that’s maybe got 5, 10,000 people. You know, it’s a really, really totally different ball game.

What is the most common strategic mistake you see leaders making when implementing AI across their organisations?

I think the biggest trap that leaders fall into is the potential of delegation. I mean, this kind of brings me back to, you know, another point that’s heavily connected to this, which is what type of an organisation are you?

Because if it is just you and a couple of people, then you can get very hands-on with AI, whereas I think, you know, there is a tendency when you’re a big organisation, maybe you’ve got departments with skill sets, to maybe think AI needs to be handed over to IT and tech.

And so, I’d say the biggest trap to fall into with AI is thinking that it’s for a department to deal with and to be dealt with in silos, where for me it’s very much a core part of business.

It has the potential to sit in many different positions within the organisation because we’ve got many different types of workflows, from marketing and sales, you know, acquiring customers, right the way through to the way the actual business model operates. I would say get hands-on, understand it, and then very much align it to where the business is going in terms of strategy.

How can businesses move beyond experimentation and directly link AI adoption to measurable commercial growth and performance?

So that’s a great question because business growth is what businesses actually should be all about. I mean, I have got this very interesting talk where we actually explore what a business is actually meant to be doing. How do you know when you’re succeeding in business? A great analogy is we know when we’re succeeding in sport because there’s rules, there’s points, and it’s really nice and clear.

And you know, when I meet with business owners and business leaders and I say, what is your goal? What is the purpose of your business? You can get many, many different answers, but for me it’s really nice and clear and it’s about gross profit. Businesses grow on gross profit, and so therefore it’s about how can we provide great value, how can we be profitable so that all the stakeholders win.

And I think when you kind of understand that and you’ve come from that perspective, then it very much becomes what’s our constraint to growth, how can we open up some of these problems we’ve got and move into that growth opportunity. And then for me, that’s when I like to then really bring AI alongside and see where it can help leverage those opportunities.

How should business leaders be thinking about AI emotionally and culturally, as well as strategically, as it becomes a permanent part of everyday working life?

For me it’s embracing the fact that AI is here, embracing that it’s affecting all of our technology. Being inspired and excited to use it, not being afraid.

And a really great metaphor I like to use for this is just think of it’s a big huge wave. It’s a big change. And I think the way that we look at life in general, we can turn changes in our lives into opportunities or challenges. So, for me, it’s this big wave’s coming. It’s here. We’re all within it.

And you can either get wiped out and you can talk about the problems it’s bringing, or you can actually face it head on, pick up your surfboard, and you can kind of ride it and enjoy it.

I think that our minds are very much like parachutes. I think they work when they’re open. So I think if we can be open-minded, hands-on, and very much from a business perspective, think about the effect it’s having on what you do in your organisation.

And one last point on that as well is I would also like just to point out that for some people AI is not an important part of their world, and that’s fine. I mean, there is something called IPL, which is referred to as in-person live, and there is such value on human connection, and us just meeting together and socialising together, that it’s also important to recognise that sometimes it is good to just say AI is not right for this, and understanding that difference.

But where it is relevant, which even if your business is an impersonalised business at its business model, for example, if you run festivals, if you run concerts, well, that’s very much in-person live, where you’ve got the singer, the performer, and you’ve got the audience, but yet you could use AI to target and to market and to sell tickets. I think it’s just recognising there’s a place for it, but let’s get excited.