Latest news with #Howson
Forbes
15-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
AI Crosstalk On Your Claim
sifting through stacks of paper files and folders Sometimes it's still difficult to envision exactly how the newest LLM technologies are going to connect to real life implementations and use cases in a given industry. Other times, it's a lot easier. But just this past year, we've been hearing a lot about AI agents, and sort of, for lack of a better term, humanizing the technology that's in play. An AI agent is specialized – it's focused on a set of tasks. It is less general than a generic sort of neural network, and it's trained towards some particular goals and objectives. We've seen this work out in handling the tough kinds of projects that used to require a lot more granular human attention. We've also seen how API technology and related advances can allow models like Anthropic's Claude to perform tasks on computers, and that's a game-changer for the industry, too. So what are these models going to be doing in business? Cindi Howson has an idea. As Chief Data Strategy Officer at Thoughtspot, she has a front-row seat to this type of innovation. Talking at an Imagination in Action event in April, she gave an example of how this would work in the insurance industry – I want to include this in monologue form, because it lays out how an implementation could work, in a practical way. 'A homeowner will have questions,' she said, ''should I submit a claim? What will happen if I do that? Is this even covered? Will my policy rates go up?' The carrier will say, 'Well, does the policy include the coverage? Should I send an adjuster out? If I send an adjuster now … how much are the shingles going to cost me, or steel or wood? and this is changing day to day.' All of this includes data questions. So if you could re-imagine, all of this is now manual (and) can take a long time. What if we could say, let's have an AI agent … looking at the latest state of those roofing structures. That agent then calls a data AI agent, so this could be something like Thoughtspot, that is looking up how many homeowners have a policy with roofs that are damaged. The claims agent, another agent could preemptively say, 'let's pay that claim.' Imagine the customer loyalty and satisfaction if you did that preemptively, and the claims agent then pays the claim.' It's essentially ensemble learning for AI, in the field of insurance, and Howson suggested there are many other fields where agentic collaboration could work this way. Each agent plays its particular role. You could almost sketch out an org chart the same way that you do with human staff. And then, presumably, they could sketch humans in, too. Howson mentioned human in the loop in passing, and it's likely that many companies will adopt a hybrid approach. (We'll see that idea of hybrid implementation show up later here as well.) Our people at the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence are working on this kind of thing, as you can see. In general, what Howson is talking about has a relation to APIs and the connective tissue of technology as we meld systems together. 'AI is the only interface you need,' she said, in thinking about how things get connected, now, and how they will get connected in the future. Explaining how she does research on her smartphone, and how AI connects elements of a network to, in her words, 'power the autonomous enterprise,' Howson led us to envision a world where our research and other tasks are increasingly out of our own hands. Of course, the quality of data is paramount. 'It could be customer health, NPS scores adoption trackers, but to do this you've got to have good data,' she said. 'So how can you prepare your data? And AI strategy must align to your business strategy, otherwise, it's just tech. You cannot do AI without a solid data foundation.' Later in her talk, Howson discussed how business leaders can bring together the structured data from things like live chatbots, and more structured data, for example, semi-structured PDFs sitting on old network drives. So legacy migration is going to be a major component of this. And the way that it's done is important. 'Bring people along on the journey,' she said. There was another point in this presentation that I thought was useful in the business world. Howson pointed out how companies have a choice – to send everything to the cloud, to keep it all on premises, or to adopt a hybrid approach. Vendors, she said, will often recommend either all one or all the other , but a hybrid approach works well for many businesses. She ended with an appeal to the imagination: Think big, imagine big,' she said. 'Imagine the whole workflow: start small, but then be prepared to scale fast.' I think it's likely that a large number of leadership teams will implement something like this in the year 2025. We've already seen some innovations like MCP that helped usher in the era of AI agents. This gives us a little bit of an illustration of how we get there.
BBC News
12-03-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
Howson thanks Woodgate for Boro defensive help
Middlesbrough captain Jonny Howson has thanked assistant head coach Jonathan Woodgate for crucial advice in helping him adjust to a defensive made his first start since December in Tuesday's 2-1 win over QPR as a makeshift veteran midfielder, 36, was pressed into service because of injuries to all four of Boro's centre-halves and stand-in Luke Ayling."The one that's helped me the most is Woody," he told BBC Radio Tees."He's someone that I'm always going to listen to because he's passionate about what he does. "But he's been there and done it at the highest level. And the amount of things I've learned from him is enormous." 'Worst season of my career' It has been a stop-start season for Howson with the QPR game being only his sixth league was out from August until October with a leg injury and then a calf problem put him on the sidelines from December until he returned as a substitute in the defeat at Swansea City four days making his debut as an 18-year-old for Leeds United in 2006, Howson has racked up 745 career appearances for the West Yorkshire side, Boro and Norwich City, averaging nearly 37 league games per season across almost two with nine games to go this season, he is set for his lowest number played in any season since his very first."It's been a frustrating season for myself with the injuries I've picked up and little setbacks along the way," he said. "It can be tough but I feel for some of the lads who have had longer-term injuries."I've been very fortunate throughout my career with injuries but this has been the worst season of my career, but it's perspective isn't it? "I'm disappointed, but it could have been worse. I could have had these when I was younger." Listen to the full interview with Jonny Howson on Middlesbrough's Red Alert Podcast. Available on BBC Sounds and by clicking here.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
🎧 Howson and Borges impress in defence
"I'll do whatever's asked of me. I did it as a young lad coming through and I'm doing it as an old lad on the way out. That'll never change," Middlesbrough midfielder-turned-defender Jonny Howson tells BBC Radio Tees. In the absence of fit central defenders, Howson and left-back Neto Borges transformed into high-quality centre-backs to help Boro into a 2-1 win against fellow play-off chasers Queen's Park Rangers on Tuesday night. Paul Addison is joined by former Middlesbrough midfielder Neil Maddison to talk about the makeshift defensive duo and the Teeside team's performance as they look to return to the top six. Includes interviews with Howson and boss Michael Carrick. You can listen to the full reaction and more on the Red Alert podcast.
BBC News
12-03-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
🎧 Howson and Borges impress in defence
"I'll do whatever's asked of me. I did it as a young lad coming through and I'm doing it as an old lad on the way out. That'll never change," Middlesbrough midfielder-turned-defender Jonny Howson tells BBC Radio the absence of fit central defenders, Howson and left-back Neto Borges transformed into high-quality centre-backs to help Boro into a 2-1 win against fellow play-off chasers Queen's Park Rangers on Tuesday Addison is joined by former Middlesbrough midfielder Neil Maddison to talk about the makeshift defensive duo and the Teeside team's performance as they look to return to the top interviews with Howson and boss Michael can listen to the full reaction and more on the Red Alert podcast.
Yahoo
19-02-2025
- Yahoo
Rapist who set fire to woman's hair jailed
A rapist who subjected women and girls to a string of assaults and sexual violence, including setting light to one victim's hair, has been jailed. Preston Crown Court heard Marc Howson also wrapped telephone wire around her neck, as well as stubbing out a cigarette on another victim's cheek and repeatedly raping and sexually assaulting them. Howson, 48, from Blackpool, was sentenced to 26 years in jail with a four-year extended licence, at a hearing on Monday. He had previously been found guilty by a jury at the same court on 15 November. During his trial, jurors heard Howson, of Somerset Avenue, had subjected women and girls to a catalogue of abuse over a 10-year period in the 1990s and 2000s. The jury found him guilty of a total of 11 counts against three victims – six of rape, including one count that included multiple incidents, three of assault and two of indecent assault. Howson was also made the subject of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and was ordered to sign the Sex Offenders' Register for life. Speaking after the sentencing hearing, Det Sgt Kat Knock from Lancashire Police said she wanted to commend the three women for having the courage to speak about what happened to them. "Without their bravery, Howson's monstrous crimes may never have come to light," she said. Det Sgt Knock said: "The level of depravity he subjected his victims to beggars belief - he is a clear danger to women and I welcome the fact that he is now behind bars for a lengthy period of time." She said she hoped his sentence gave the women "some sense that justice has been done" and encouraged others who may have suffered similar abuse to come forward and report it. Listen to the best of BBC Radio Lancashire on Sounds and follow BBC Lancashire on Facebook, X and Instagram and watch BBC North West Tonight on BBC iPlayer. HM Courts and Tribunal Service
