Zack Kass, Former OpenAI Leader, Urges Retail Execs To Champion AI

The difference between a company’s future success or failure will be based on its management’s commitment to understanding the capabilities of AI, believes Zack Kass, AI futurist and the first and former head of go-to-market at OpenAI. “I believe the single most important factor for companies successfully working with AI is an executive team committed to its potential. Some boardrooms and executives in Fortune 100 companies are not yet convinced that AI will revolutionize their businesses or industries. It doesn’t matter what else happens within these companies; they will likely struggle,” said Kass in his keynote address at the Zeta Next Intelligence conference.

Future AI Will Have A Broad Impact On People

Kass has a big vision when it comes to the impact of AI and was not shy about sharing his ideas for embracing AI as the way forward. “I think more in terms of people than just consumers. My expectation broadly is that we are entering at some point in the near future a human renaissance of some kind. I don’t think it will come without cost. All progress has cost,” said Kass. His vision of the future expands beyond the scope of improving customer experiences and will actually improve the lives of people. “There seems to be a high likelihood that we will, as a species, catapult forward in some great leap, wherein we cure most of our immutable diseases, approach near zero cost for a lot of goods and services, like we’ve done with water or electricity in most of the first world, and eventually probably arrive at a place where we spend a whole lot more time doing the things that we love. I don’t know when that is, but it’s within the next 50 to 100 years,” said Kass.

Companies that have experienced higher business costs including those for merchandise and services, customer acquisition, and employment, should jump on the opportunity to live in a world where near zero cost of goods is a reality. “The single thread that binds most of the companies embracing AI is an executive team that’s committed to this,” said Kass. The next characteristic is a company that is willing to reimagine everything from a first principle standpoint according to Kass. “So to the extent that a company has an executive team convinced this is the most important thing to think about, and the extent to which the company broadly is willing to say, What if we reimagined our whole industry? — those businesses are having the most success,” said Kass.

Workforce Changes With AI

When discussing the impact of AI on today’s workforce, Kass explained how AI will most likely commoditize most of the skills and knowledge of the workforce. However, there are some things that AI is not capable of doing. “So, connecting dots— humans are still required for this. But the major piece that we observe in AI is that it actually is not capable of doing the things that require wisdom, courage, vision, empathy, and curiosity; these immutable human qualities,” stated Kass.

“My assumption is that most people’s jobs are going to reduce to the parts of the job that are the most humanistic because everything that’s computational will probably get automated. I also will say that I think most people who work with their hands will have a whole lot more success in the future sort of differentiating themselves because we’re just pretty far off with robots,” said Kass.

Hyper-Personalization Becomes Real

As companies continue to build omnichannel experiences and focus on more personalized experiences, they are building deeper connections with the target markets. Akin to the scene in Minority Report where Tom Cruise is walking through the mall and getting exposed to all kinds of personalized marketing, AI can play a pivotal role in getting companies closer to that level of personalization. “We’ll probably get to that place soon enough where you can walk into a store or you can walk into an experience and have it feel exceptionally personalized. And why does everyone love their local watering hole? It’s because they’re their regular and we all want to feel like we’re in a familiar space,” said Kass.

As companies think about the future of AI and its impact across industries, they need to take a fresh look at internal business processes that can be handled by AI capabilities while leveraging the creative work with human intervention. “My hope is that we all become much more creative. For two reasons: one, we will end up spending less time on the computational busy work and, two, the expectation here should be that we end up doing things that accrue value to ourselves much more frequently than we do today. And I think that includes creative thinking, critical thinking, complex problem-solving,” said Kass.

Key Takeaways Regarding AI’s Impact On Retail

Retailers and brands should view AI as an enabler, focus on the human element, invest in capabilities strategically, and manage ethics responsibly. Companies should be transparent, promote upskilling, involve employees early in the process, and focus messaging on AI as an enabler to build trust and engagement.

AI will commoditize many existing skills and jobs, so human qualities like wisdom, empathy, and creativity will remain valuable. Therefore, retailers should focus on cultivating these human strengths and create a culture of innovation. Companies should emphasize that AI is a tool to enhance productivity and creativity, not replace human employees.

Retailers should involve employees early in AI implementation through feedback surveys, focus groups, and pilot testing while addressing concerns proactively. Companies that provide opportunities for employees to give input on AI development and application will create deeper levels of engagement.

Applications of AI raise ethical concerns for employees and customers around bias, transparency, and job loss that leaders must address responsibly. Retailers must be transparent about how AI will impact roles and responsibilities. Managers must communicate how AI will automate certain tasks or augment human capabilities, and provide training to upskill employees.

AI can enhance productivity, the shopper experience, and creativity in retail, so retailers should look for ways to apply AI to improve operations and the customer journey. Companies can invest in AI-powered virtual sales assistants and product recommendations which can improve customer service. Marketing and personalization are being transformed by AI, presenting opportunities for retailers and brands.

The Intelligence Revolution

Inside the Intelligence Revolution was the first regional event series held at the Dallas Arboretum by Zeta Global/ Zeta Next. The goal of the event was to showcase new artificial Intelligence-powered technologies, provide hands-on engagement with AI-powered tools, and share best practices to turn the promise of AI into the reality of reshaping the landscape of marketing practices and customer experiences.

Zeta Next Dallas attendees hailed from more than 50 companies including leading brands in Retail, Financial Services, Telecom, Healthcare, and Travel & Hospitality. Topics ranged from modernizing data infrastructure to evolving data governance to realizing the full potential of personalization.