Automated Analytics Podcast: Review of the Spring Budget

Speaker 1: 0:10

Hello and welcome to a special edition of the Automated Analytics podcast, this time focusing on the spring budget. We thought it'd be good to explain and comment on some of the key findings from the budget, especially Jeremy Hunt's significant announcements about using AI to improve productivity in the public sector. This is, of course, an area automated analytics have been keen to support, both locally the Doncaster Chamber of Commerce and at a national level, with the Department of Work and Pensions and the NHS. And with me today is Mark Tader, ceo of Automated Analytics. Mark, firstly, what were your initial thoughts on some of the statements made yesterday?

Speaker 2: 0:53

Well, thank you, katie, and thank you for inviting me on to talk about the government's budget. Well, I have to say, when we put in our budget submission back in January, I was concerned that government wouldn't listen to us in terms of seeing AI as an opportunity to invest and particularly grow productivity, and it's great to see the government have announced that they're actually going to be investing in AI. I think, with over 100 million plans to be invested into the Allenturing Institute, is a stake in the ground, definitely a line in the sand, that this government wants to invest in AI for productivity. At the end of the day, we are behind our other G7 competitors or countries within G7 on our productivity per worker. We're down about 16% and have been for some time, and, as we've seen, ai really is an opportunity to increase productivity and the fact that the government is investing in our fully supports our submission to the government's budget that we put in in January.

Speaker 2: 1:49

Now there is still a lot of negativity around AI. People are concerned they're going to lose their job. Can we control it? What's the damage that self-generative AI can do against the supervised model and also, does it really work? But this is a clear statement from the government that they see AI as benefiting the economy and being able to increase the input of our workforce.

Speaker 1: 2:12

Thank you, mark. So you mentioned their supervised and self-generative. For our audience, who might not know the difference, do you share?

Speaker 2: 2:20

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, they're two very, very different models. So when you think of a supervised versus self-generative model, I often use the expression of a bowling alley. So when you go to Tempe in bowling and you raise the barriers up on the edge of the bowling so the ball kind of hits the barriers but still hits its target, it's very, very similar to a supervised model. What you've got is a human being that is analyzing that model to make sure of its accuracy. So, essentially, the output of the data is a lot more trustworthy than a self-generative model. The most important model is what you often see with fake pictures in the news some elements of chat, gpt, a self-generative. What that means is you're getting information but no one's actually checking it to make sure it's actually accurate.

Speaker 2: 3:04

Now, a supervised model, which is we have 5,000 clients that use our supervised model both in the UK and USA, which is why it's trustworthy is, whilst it takes a bit more time and use a bit more resource in a human, you get a lot more accurate data out of it, and so therefore, for us, that's where we see legislation really needed in those self-generation models, because they literally can define anything or come up with anything, and it doesn't necessarily have to be true, but it's self-generative, and that's, to me, is where legislation needs to come in as to what self-generative models can be used and how they can be used, whereas our model, because it's supervised. That's why we get great results for our clients. That's why we've got over 5,000 clients in the UK and USA now using AI very successfully to drive productivity gains, cut down admin time, decrease costs, increase profitability, because the data we're producing from our supervised model is a lot more trustworthy.

Speaker 1: 4:04

A word that we heard a lot in the budget yesterday was the word productivity, which I know can kind of have all sorts of different connotations. But for you, and with the clients you've serviced across the world, what does that mean and why is it actually a good word to be using?

Speaker 2: 4:20

Yeah, productivity is not a bad word. I must stress this, and I think sometimes when people think of productivity, they think of, you know, poor staff or stuff that aren't very good. That's not what we're talking about. It's not what we're about. Productivity gains is actually enabling that person to do their job without the weight of admin that they have to do that's associated with their job.

Speaker 2: 4:41

So, for example, in terms of a recruiter, you know manny uploading jobs to Indeed why don't you just automate the process? You know listening to telephone calls to analyze the outcome of every call that NHS has to do with, the 999 and 111 calls. Well, you can automate the whole process using AI, and to me, that's what the benefit of AI is. The benefit of AI is making your staff enable them to do the job they're actually employed to do, rather than these mundane, boring admin tasks that take away from what their core value is to your business, which is doing the job that they were hired for. And so, for me, AI has a massive role to play in that productivity gain that companies can make. And, again, across all of our clients that we work with in the UK, US, they're all making massive productivity productivity gains which are driving big efficiencies in their business, which means they're growing at a faster rate, which is really exciting to be part of.

Speaker 1: 5:33

And I guess, when you think about the definition being about, you know, employees being able to unleash their talent, that can only make them happier and more satisfied than their roles.

Speaker 2: 5:43

Yeah, absolutely the amount of calls and teams meetings that are now going on, where I actually am greeted by smiling happy people that have. Hey, we've actually increased, you know, our hire rate by 20% or we've reduced our costs by 15%, because they've actually now got the time to do the job they're actually employed to do, rather being weighed down, you know, with admin tasks and with activity that's taken away from their core role. And that's why I think, when you look at AI, it can have a massive impact within the public sector, because if ever there is an organisation that's weighed down by process and paperwork and inadequate computer systems, you know it's the public sector and that's where we see a massive benefit moving forward.

Speaker 1: 6:26

And a big opportunity, absolutely, and where do you think AI can help both the private and the public sector?

Speaker 2: 6:37

Well, the first thing is it was very warming to see that the government has pledged I think it's about 7 million pounds to actually upskill SMEs. I see as a massive opportunity within the SME community the small, medium sized businesses you know, members of the Chamber of Commerce that I speak to regularly and really upskilling their knowledge and their understanding of where they can implement AI, because there's a lot of productivity gains that can be made there. But also, it's really warming to see that the Cabinet Office is going to be working with a number of different departments to finalise their AI adoption strategies. You know, I think there's massive gains we've made in the NHS in terms of improving patient care and patient wait times.

Speaker 2: 7:19

I think there's a lot of information that the civil service can use to analyse data, and the Department of Work and Pensions I mean our budget submission was very much behind assisting and helping people back to work by using our AI solution, and I think there's a lot of productivity gains, a lot of opportunity that the government has, but it's also the private sector as well. As you know, we've delivered our AI solutions to over 4,000 clients globally and not one of them has ended up making a single redundancy off the back of the implementer. In fact, it's driven efficiencies to employ more people. So it's really good that the government is seeing internally and looking internally to actually implement AI, as well as supporting, you know, enterprise like SMEs and the larger enterprises to actually fully roll out AI to get those productivity gains.

Speaker 1: 8:10

Absolutely. And touching then back on the budget submission, you mentioned that automated analytics made to the Treasury. You clearly had a view on how automated analytics is. You know proprietary AI technology could help the government achieve its aims. Can you give us a flavour of what you proposed, mark?

Speaker 2: 8:30

Yes, I mean you've got to understand that we we automate analytics is very much a private sector business. Today we very much focused on on helping the private sector, you know, reduce admin time, you know, reduce costs and increase profitability through the adoption of of AI. And we see the potential. There's an opportunity to create almost like an AI incubator within the UK government that has in-house expertise, consists of the most talented technology professionals in the UK who can apply their skills and their expertise to benefit AI across the public sector. So it's not just investing in the entering facilities we talked about, it's actually creating that incubator environment because there's a lot of benefit and a lot of AI opportunity that let alone the NHS, but a lot of other government departments that can use.

Speaker 2: 9:22

I mean the fact that the DWP are committing 17 million to accelerate the AI digital transformation, I think is a brilliant sign of the government really committing and that's why really we made our budget submission around supporting that back to work activity.

Speaker 2: 9:40

As we've seen with our clients in America, we've seen with our clients in the UK actually being able to hire more people and fill those vacancies. There's a massive improvement in the profitability and I think already it's building on the progress that we've made and it's making sure that the Department of Work and Pensions we support them in driving those people back to work. I also think there's a massive opportunity within the NHS. We've already been approached with helping them analyze 999 and 111 calls. I think there's also a massive opportunity in recruitment and ensuring that the right staff resource and the right level of staff is available within the NHS, because it's a very, very stressed department at the moment. There's a lot going on and I think for me, it's all about looking at the government and how you can reduce that admin process, that admin time, and using AI to distinguish and really boost that product sector productivity to enable them to make decisions quicker and faster.

Speaker 1: 10:42

Absolutely. I think one of the key issues that we have seen is companies and also individuals having issues around trusting AI, key concerns being that it could lead to job losses, which you touched on, that it won't and that it can be controlled. What are your thoughts on that?

Speaker 2: 11:02

Well, the good news is is the AI Safety Institute is actually just completed and it's the world's first led by any government and complete end-to-end start and end analysis of AI models and I think the concern about AI taking over and people losing their jobs, as I've mentioned earlier, we've just not seen that happen. Now, there is a big difference between a self-generative model and a supervised model. Obviously, we use a supervised model to deliver the cost savings, the profit increases and the reduction admin time in the solutions that we operate for our clients. But for me, that trust issue really start with the legislation that I think the government are looking to produce. They produced a white paper a couple of weeks ago. Obviously, completing this evaluation of models that are out there in the marketplace, I think, is a great step forward. It is world first. So they're clearly aligning themselves to cover off this trust issue, because even today, we see and I get asked a lot of questions about am I going to lose my job, can this really really be controlled and does it really really work?

Speaker 2: 12:11

And I think what some people struggle to cope with is that AI has been with us for a number of years. If you take Netflix, for example, there is AI to present films back to you that they think that you're going to like. So, even everyday life, you're probably experiencing AI without even knowing it. And for me, that safety issue I think it should be covered off at government level. People should feel confident and should learn to trust AI, obviously in the right environment for the right solution, and I think with the government leading it the way they are, we're in a very good footing to get over that hurdle. I think most people have was can I trust it or am I going to lose my job? Does it really do what it says it's going to do? I think for me for adoption to be more rife within UK business, I think it's really that understanding and getting over that trust hurdle is absolutely key to not only, I would say, businesses, but also the public sector adopting AI and getting those efficiencies and that productivity game that we're all looking after.

Speaker 1: 13:17

Absolutely Well. That brings the special addition to a close, which we focus on the spring budget, and clearly it's been very warming and reassuring to see certain measures that ultimate analytics put in their spring budget submission can start to bear fruit. Is this the government's first AI budget, of many to come, who knows? But the podcast will be back, as you can expect, for future episodes, and please do hit subscribe on Apple Podcasts and thank you for listening.