Miles Ward is the CTO of SADA, An Insight companya leading Google Cloud Partner.
AI is rapidly transforming how we live and work, moving beyond simple automation to enable entirely new possibilities.
While much attention has been focused on the underlying technology—the specific models or the infrastructure that powers them—the true power of AI lies in its practical applications and its ability to augment human capabilities.
This article explores the refinement and solidification of viable AI use cases—from basic chatbots to sophisticated agentic workflows—and delves into the transformative concept of “service as a software.”
The Role Of AI Agents
The core idea is a shift in focus: not just how we interact with AI (e.g., through apps or dialogs) but what we can achieve with it.
My company, for example, is working to help customers move beyond the limitations of simple, reactive chatbots to the exciting possibilities of more complex, agentic workflows. In a recent discussion with a key leader on my team responsible for AI and ML, we explored how intelligent agents can provide information and take action, automating complex processes and augmenting human capabilities. Examples include:
• 24/7 Virtual Agents: Handling routine tasks such as booking reservations, providing customer support and answering frequently asked questions, freeing up human agents to handle more complex or sensitive inquiries. For a customer needing to change a flight at 3 a.m., a virtual agent can provide immediate assistance, improving customer satisfaction.
• Proactive Agents Within CRM Systems: Analyzing vast amounts of customer data within CRM systems and crafting suggestions for an audience of one, such as targeted marketing campaigns or personalized customer outreach, based on identified trends and patterns combined with the specific context of that customer’s journey and history. These agents could identify customers with similar purchasing behaviors and suggest bundled offers or personalized recommendations.
• AI-Powered Code Generation: Empowering non-developers to create functional applications and automate tasks using natural language prompts, significantly lowering the barrier to entry for software development. This allows individuals with domain expertise but limited coding skills to build tools that directly address their specific needs.
• Automating Mundane Tasks: Offloading tedious and time-consuming tasks like expense reports, data entry and report generation, freeing up human workers to focus on more strategic and creative activities. This automation can significantly boost productivity and reduce employee burnout.
This shift is not just about replacing mundane tasks with automated processes; it’s also about enabling entirely new possibilities, including tasks and workflows that were previously too expensive, too complex or simply too impractical to perform with traditional methods. For example, an AI agent could analyze complex market data and identify emerging trends that would be incredibly time-consuming and costly for a human analyst to detect in the same timeframe.
The Rise Of ‘Service As A Software’
The discussion with my team member also highlighted the increasing “democratization” of AI and introduced the compelling concept of “service as a software.”
Many services traditionally provided by human teams or third-party companies can now be effectively automated through AI-powered software solutions. This shift significantly lowers the barrier to entry for smaller businesses, individual employees and even individual entrepreneurs to leverage AI for highly specific, niche problems.
This isn’t for the kinds of things that there are already startup categories for; it’s for all the little, nuanced, weird things unique to your company.
Maybe you need to schedule time on offline devices, to coordinate inserts of data into disparate SaaS tools or to work through internal inter-team approval communications. You might have used an executive assistant, or a data engineer or a project manager before, but perhaps with AI, you can build the little unique structural tools that can accelerate your unique business in ways previously only human help could do.
This “service-as-a-software” model makes professional-grade services accessible and affordable to a much wider audience.
Addressing Challenges
This paradigm shift, however, brings with it a new set of challenges related to software development, maintenance, security and licensing. Businesses must become more sophisticated in their evaluation processes, carefully considering not just the immediate functionality of AI tools but also the long-term implications, including associated risks and responsibilities.
“Service as a software” unlocks huge potential, no doubt. But it’s not a free lunch. You’re trading one set of problems for another. You can’t just plug it in and forget about it. Instead of managing people, you’re managing software—which comes with its own baggage:
• Data Security And Privacy: Ensuring that sensitive data used by AI-powered services is protected from unauthorized access and misuse.
• Vendor Lock-In: Carefully evaluating licensing agreements and considering the potential for vendor lock-in when relying on third-party AI services.
• Ethical Considerations: Addressing the ethical implications of using AI to automate services, including potential biases and unintended consequences.
• Maintenance And Updates: Planning for the ongoing maintenance and updates required to keep AI-powered services running smoothly and effectively.
You have to think long-term: How do you keep it secure? What happens if the vendor changes the rules? How do you make sure it’s fair?
Also, because this new kind of software isn’t deterministic, you also actually keep some of the problems from manual workflows: How do you check work? How are you inspecting what you expect? What are the graceful failovers, backup plans and secondary “in emergency, break glass” processes in case tools are offline?
These are the questions smart businesses are asking.
The key takeaways for 2025 and beyond are clear: Businesses that effectively leverage AI to automate processes, enhance customer experiences and unlock new opportunities will unleash new possibilities and opportunities.
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