McKinsey’s Succinct AI Guide Helps Executives Quickly Understand

Day in and day out, news headlines, blog articles, Youtube channels and more feature the different ways in which technology regularly impacts various aspects of business. A keyword through all of the talk and noise is “AI.”

The term, “artificial intelligence” might just be the buzzword of 2018. As the AI race continues and grows exponentially hour by hour, executives, managers and employees alike need to understand the basics of this crucial technological component in order to make effective and flexible decision when necessary.

One of the issues that executives and their business units face in understanding the basics is knowing where exactly to look for such explanations in a clear and succinct manner. Time is a luxury that many executives and employees do not have in the integrated and fast-paced work environments of today. Yet, these executives and managers of business units still need to understand the basics of AI.

McKinsey’s AI walk-through, “An executive’s guide to AI” tackles this timing problem head-on by providing a succinct and interactive explanation. The guide lays out the fundamentals of artificial intelligence in a contextualized manner that business executives can easily understands in addition to providing very relatable use cases. The guide is broken down into the following sections:

• Artificial Intelligence: this section provides a basic definition and examples of AI in today’s world.
• Timeline: Why AI Now?: an interactive timeline lays out previous milestones for why AI is turning into a reality
• Machine Learning: this section provides a basic definition of machine learning and how businesses use it in today’s workplace. The section also illustrates the various categories of machine learning.
• Major Types (of Machine Learning): this portion drills into the different aspects of machine learning – supervised learning, unsupervised learning and reinforcement learning.
• Deep Learning: this section provides more detail on a specific type of machine learning, deep learning, and how deep learning is unique from other forms while being more valuable to many business types.
• Major Types (of Deep Learning): an easy breakdown of two leading deep learning types, convolutional neural networks and recurrent neural networks.
• Use Cases: this section provides tangible examples for how both machine learning and deep learning can be used in different business contexts.

If an executive, manager or employees needs to understand the very basics of AI, look no further than this McKinsey’s guide. It will provide a robust foundation that any business unit can use as a foundation for further exploration of different aspects in AI. One such facet is the realm of how major tech giants such as Google are leveraging deep learning to improve their business models. The ways in which AI is impacting business is only starting out. Executives need to understand the basics and be prepared to make informative decisions based on holistic resources such as McKinsey.