How We Use AI: Our Values-Driven Policies for Responsible AI Use in Business

Something can be two things at once, which certainly describes AI.

The recent developments in AI capabilities are both exciting and disappointing, helpful and frustrating, promising and concerning.

In short: It’s complicated. As a team, we’ve spent time weighing how we use AI in our work as an impact-focused company.

Below, you will find our current usage guidelines and where we stand on the integration of AI into business practices.

How we use AI aligns with our 3-step process of strategy development:

People
First

We understand the impact AI tools have on people and pace implementation based on how we can support them through the inevitable transitions.

Systems Second

We strive to create systems for evaluating, testing, and implementing an AI tool BEFORE deploying it in the company.

Innovation Third

Only then do we get to innovation, where we consider how to amplify our impact and increase profits through the use of AI.

We know AI technology will continue to evolve, as will how we use it. What will not change is our commitment to human-centered, values-driven practices that support a more equitable world.

To learn more about how we see AI being used in business, check out these articles from our blog:

How We Use AI In Our Work And With Our Clients:

We do not…

We sometimes…

Use AI to suggest headlines, generate ideas for social media posts, and ideate names and titles.
Use AI to make writing internal reports, processes, and SOPs more efficient.
Use AI to help generate ideas. Before we run with one of those ideas, we do secondary research to see what’s already been said/done/created there.

We often…

Values-Driven Marketing & AI: What We Believe and Advocate For

We don’t believe in adding noise to the world just because it’s easier now. That means using AI to assist in creating content primarily for another machine (like Google Search or Instagram’s algorithm) is never acceptable and is actively bad for all of us.
We believe that copyrights matter and that the development of AI needs to find a way to honor and compensate the work of creators, thinkers, and innovators who made building these models possible.
We believe in AI as a help-mate, not in the promise of complete automation.
We believe in human accountability. Assisted decision-making holds promise, but humans need to make the calls and be held responsible for them.
We believe that marketing jobs are fundamentally changing, as are many other professions, and that reskilling is an essential piece of values-driven business in areas where AI tools are changing the game.
We believe that privacy and data rights matter. Faster isn’t better if it sacrifices our customer’s right to privacy or misuses data.
We believe that decisions and strategies should be data-aware and data-informed, but “data-driven” isn’t a thing. We don’t get to blame our decisions on data.
We believe in the creative possibilities of humans using AI to build and create new and exciting things, ideas, and ways of being.
We also believe this must be done carefully and responsibly. The mistakes of algorithmic world-building from Web 2.0 are illustrative of what we don’t want to repeat and could do better. Aka: The rose-colored glasses are OFF about the dangers and promises of evolving technology.
We take seriously the hazards of AI’s ability to deceive and are actively following and engaging with organizations trying to work out how to add transparency tools to this space.

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