Recent press articles had my mother phone me expressing concern that Artificial Intelligence would take away our jobs! I seem to recall they said the same thing about computers that spawned a global industry now worth over $5 trillion dollars.

Being passionate about technology and procurement, I am awaiting for the technology providers to explain how those frustrating business processes that users struggle to follow will be transformed to relegate the front and back office obsolete.

Disruptive technology often benefits us in ways we had not initially considered. There is one key ingredient I believe AI requires to transform our lives, COGNITIVE.

Cognitive involves human perception; it addresses how we think, learn and remember. Each of us is wired differently: How we interact, the level of intuition we employ to make sense of the world and intellectually reason a fact to form knowledge makes us who we are.

Any fool can know, the point is to understand.

Albert Einstein

Cognitive science connects with the way you think and behave. Our ability to process information, solve problems, interpret speech and visual signals, for example reading someones body language, helps us to form decisions. This will be core to how AI will create value. If we cannot interact or make sense of AI output, despite limitless intelligence and the endless possibly of insights, we will struggle to leverage its full potential. It’s akin to the cleverest human with poor interpersonal skills facing cultural barriers in a world dominated by us ordinary mainstream folks.

Cognitive AI enables a machine to infer, reason, and learn in a way that emulates the way humans do things. Cognitive AI does this by processing both structured and unstructured data, and experiencing interactions between humans and between machines. It is worth distinguishing between RPA (Robot Process Automation) which automates repetitive tasks using structured data. RPA has already made significant productivity and efficiency gains for many organizations.

Combine Cognitive AI with RPA and we then have cognitive bots able to reason and make decisions. The challenge is who is teaching the bot the right answer and defining the data structure; its us humans again. Outside the concern of AI bias, more to the point there is often no single right answer in life. After all what is right for you, may not be right for me. Our individual complexity can create frustration for others.

Cognitive bots analyze processes, recognize inefficiencies and create recommendations to increase productivity and quality. Humans remain the ultimate decision makers. Our role transforms to address how we configure and manage cognitive bots. Our individual workload just got more impactful!

It’s by learning new things in life that makes us grow. For me it’s a thumbs up opportunity.