Make AI Part of Your Life & Get To The Next Level: Kellogg School's Mohanbir Sawhney

Generative AI has taken over 80 per cent of functions. It’s the 20 per cent where human role is required that is critical. In the world of work today, an individual who doesn’t use AI is at a great disadvantage as against those who do. However, using AI tools also requires good understanding of the domain. For example, good prompts are needed for great output. These insights were shared by Mohanbir Sawhney, McCormic Foundation Chair of Technology, Director of the Centre for Research in Technology & Innovation, Associate Dean, Digital Innovation, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, in Gurugram on January 16. He was speaking on the theme ‘Unlocking Business Value from Generative AI: The CXO Agenda’, at an event organised by IMT Ghaziabad. 

Following his address, he also engaged in a discussion on the theme with Annurag Batra, Editor-in-chief, BW Businessworld, and Founder, Exchange4Media.

He ran the gathering through the journey of generative AI, its mindboggling development since 2017, the infrastructure, the models generative AI canvas, and how AI can be used, including for creation of catalogues, extraction of knowledge and creation of content including co-creation of case studies in academics, videos and designs.  He advocated for using AI to extract information as that gives focussed results rather than using search engines that give 100 results. To the management education fraternity at the event, he advised, “You can not avoid AI, so make it part of your life to get to the next level.”

An area of concern is ethical use of AI. On this subject, Sawhney said, “Regulations are always reactive. The field is developing so fast, that regulations will be like drawing a line on a sand dune,” Sawhney said. He appreciated the US’ approach of cocreating regulations, the spirit of which is guidance rather than draconian. In comparison, he said, EU regulations would be restrictive as they don’t have “horses in the race”. 

Sawhney was felicitated with Lifetime Achievement Award by Vishal Talwar, Director, IMT Ghaziabad.



AI in Indian Context
In an exclusive interview to BW Businessworld on the occasion, Sawhney discussed a gamut of possibilities, as well as challenges in integration of AI. He said while the US has been leading on this front, ultimately this is a race for talent. And India has the talent and technology base. “The playing field can be levelled by using the tools already created and building upon those tools, developing applications relevant for Indian context. We have big problems in education, healthcare, agriculture and so on, and creating specific applications will create opportunities.” 

On how generative AI can be integrated in education, he responded, “Education will have to be redesigned ground up. Like you can either tell students calculator is not allowed in exams or you can allow them to use calculator to do more advanced work. We need to embrace generative AI tools, to design new lessons and courses, exams and evaluations. It can also enable personalised learning.”

He pointed to the flip side, saying, “It’s the teachers who need to master the technology. They need to be trained. As they get older, and less willing to learn, they are afraid of it. So, it’s a big change management question.” 

Asked about the question of resource allocation for training in India, he responded, “It will take a proactive thought process and cooperation between the public and private sector and NGOs, to make it a nation-wide skilling initiative. We can have a national AI Education Policy. 

On the issue of regulations for copyrights, Sawhney had a different perspective. “We have to take an enlightened view on intellectual property. What if everything was open source and we found other ways to capitalise? If I make a case study using AI, and make it open source, that would be really disruptive because otherwise students have to pay $5 for every case study at some leading management institutes. So, copyright is not the only answer,”  

He was categorical that the world of work and career avenues will be dramatically transformed. “There will be job displacements. There will be net reduction in the number of people needed. But the people who will be there will be doing interesting work. In terms of careers, low level cognitive work like para legal, low-level coding, secretarial work will be badly affected. So’ we have to challenge ourselves to get to the next level of value addition in that chain and do more creative and strategic work.”

Benefits Galore
At a panel discussion on ‘Generative AI: Use Cases and Applications in the Indian Context’ moderated by Annurag Batra, Shipra Bhalla Chowdhary, Senior Director, SAP India, pointed to the huge potential of AI in Agriculture, and gave specific examples of time taken for crop forecasting coming down from 3-4 moths to 3-4 days. Similarly, AI can be used in healthcare, in bringing down infant mortality, and in governance issues, like bringing down tax default cases, she pointed out. On the other hand, Nitin Mishra, Chief Technology Officer (CTO), ONDC, pointed to the micro impact at individual level, like a farmer being able to sell his harvest directly and prospering. “It can improve the lives of people at the bottom of the pyramid,” he stressed.

Manish Mittal, Managing Principal, Axtria, describing the scenario in life sciences, said there will be more precision in results using AI. And Raghav Gupta, MD, India and Asia Pacific, Coursera, pointed out that generative AI can make learning more engaging, and widen access to high-quality education.  Ramprakash Ramamoorthy, Director, AI Research, Zoho Corp, also shed light on sectors that would become more competitive with generative AI.