RESEARCH REPORT
Thrive with responsible AI: Embedding trust can unlock value
Joint research with Amazon Web Services
5-MINUTE READ
November 29, 2024
In brief
- Despite the potential of AI, businesses are being cautious. 74% of surveyed companies temporarily paused AI projects this past year due to risks.
- Responsible AI helps to mitigate risk and maintain compliance, but research shows that it also contributes to value creation in many ways.
- To help build trust and unlock value companies must lead with a value mindset, be “responsible by design” and adopt a platform approach.
All technology counts for nothing if people hesitate to use it.
We know that responsible AI helps to mitigate risk and maintain compliance, but our joint research with Amazon Web Services (AWS)—involving more than 1,000 executives across 21 industries in 15 countries—has also shed light on its specific role as a value creator.
What we found is that responsible AI contributes to value creation in many ways ranging from enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty to product quality to talent acquisition and retention. All the while ensuring regulatory compliance and risk mitigation.
For companies that can successfully navigate the AI landscape, the opportunities are limitless.
Businesses are proceeding with caution.
56%
of Fortune 500 companies still cite AI as a "risk factor" in their annual reports, up from just 9% a year ago.
A new understanding of trust, responsible AI and value
Trust is foundational to every AI strategy—encouraging adoption, unleashing innovation and driving value. Trust is the cornerstone of value.
When companies invest in robust responsible AI governance frameworks and ensure that their AI systems are explainable and fair, trust grows. This, in turn, drives increased AI adoption, allowing innovation to thrive—and innovation is the key to value creation and growth.
Responsible AI is AI at its best—essential for achieving the full potential of AI investments. And responsible AI is critical to building trust.
82%
of organizations expect communicating a mature approach to responsible AI will significantly improve employee trust in AI adoption, leading to innovation.
25%
of organizations expect enhanced loyalty and satisfaction from offering responsible AI-enabled AI products and services.
A reminder: what is responsible AI?
Responsible AI implies taking intentional actions to design, deploy and use AI to create value and build trust by protecting against the potential risks of AI. To achieve responsible AI, organizations must move beyond defining responsible AI principles and put those principles into practice, operationalizing their responsible AI capabilities across their organization.
Delivery of 360° value: the key value levers for responsible AI
Responsible AI is a crucial driver of sustainable business success. So how do individual companies unlock its value? Our research revealed some tangible ways that responsible AI drives value, across several different levers.
61% of organizations anticipate a strong or very strong impact from responsible AI on improving contract win rates.
70% of respondents expect strong improvements in product quality and 67% expect improvements in process industrialization/shortened development cycles.
Companies investing in responsible AI expect a 25% increase in customer loyalty and satisfaction.
78% of companies believe that communicating their responsible AI efforts will improve brand perception significantly.
Less than 1% of organizations feel fully prepared to adapt to new AI-related laws over the next five years—fully-implemented responsible AI can greatly improve their readiness
45% of organizations believe there’s better than a one-in-four chance of a major AI incident occurring in the next 12 months.
82% of organizations believe that a mature approach to responsible AI will improve employee trust in AI adoption.
With responsible AI, companies expect a 20% improvement in time-to-hire, a 21% increase in the quality of recruits and a 21% boost in talent retention.
Accenture research projects potential reductions of ~40%-60% in energy consumption and carbon emissions by effectively implementing green AI.
Organizations anticipate responsible AI to improve the diversity of hires by 22%.
Accelerating the journey to responsible AI maturity—and value creation
According to our research, 72% of companies have embarked on their responsible AI journeys two years ago or less.
The research also found that by compressing investment timelines, organizations can achieve responsible AI maturity faster, accelerating time-to-value by a year or more. For companies that have been slow to launch their responsible AI initiatives, this is good news. An aggressive investment approach from the start—compressing five years of investment into three—offers the opportunity to leapfrog competitors on the typical five-year journey.
Key considerations to help you build trust and unlock value
Conclusion
Trust lies at the heart of every responsible AI strategy and businesses are beginning to understand that trust is the key to unlock the full potential of AI’s transformative technology.