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Bring back the humans: CBA's embarrassing AI jobs bungle a salutary lesson

Bring back the humans: CBA's embarrassing AI jobs bungle a salutary lesson

The Commonwealth Bank's enthusiasm to replace 45 call centre jobs with AI chatbots only to then reverse the decision could be best described as a 'break things and then say sorry' management strategy.
It is clearly embarrassing for the bank that has talked up embracing AI to publicly bungle this particular aspect of implementation.
And it is certainly a salutary lesson for all businesses that the road to AI adoption is full of bumps and potholes.
There will be plenty of chief executives around the country taking notes about this CBA experiment.
But what is even more premature is celebratory champagne popping from the union movement.
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The AI march by the CBA and others will continue – albeit in perhaps a more considered way.
This isn't a case of buyer's remorse.
Despite the hype around AI, the technology is still in its implementation infancy, particularly in Australia where many companies are talking a lot about its potential but are reluctant to provide detail about numbers of workers that will be replaced and in what areas.
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