Case2: Vodafone: Managing Advanced Technologies and Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence for Business

Individual assignment
Section – B

Name Roll No
Sarbani Mishra PGP/24/111
1. What are the implications of adopting AI across an organization?
Sol:
A) Adoption of AI will lead to a continuous data driven change approach for the
organisation
B) Working with AI will lead to redesigning of most work processes and shift from
traditional organisational structures
C) In order to maintain competitive advantage, there will be a shift from production of
products to a more bundled service oriented offerings.
D) There would be a change in organisational strategy and realignment of company
visions for adoption of AI
E) Since Artificial Intelligence needs a lot of data, sourcing that and talented workforce
with appropriate skill sets will be a major driver of change
F) Embedding AI into most of the business functions and scaling AI’s impact across the
enterprise would be needed.

2. How has Vodafone balanced competing priorities and constraints while advancing
on the adoption curve?
Sol:
A) Speed of action vs. careful deliberation:
There are two areas which Vodafone ensures to monitor to understand customer
preferences – data and High speed networks and converged solutions. This constant
watch and analysis of consumer demands enables the company to gain insights into the
type and frequency of new product launches. Company has shown restraint in launching
5G technology that too strategically it only aims to do so in urban areas shows that
Vodafone caters to the consumer demands at a quick pace but exercises caution.

B) Internal competencies vs. external reliance

To improve upon its internal competencies, Vodafone has always strived to invest in its
internal processes, technological research and has set up a separate 5 year technology
strategy which gets regularly updated. This helps the organisation to continuously
enhance consumer service, operations, products and services. All of this also helps in
establishing consumer trust thus reducing the need for external reliance.

C) Country-level responsibilities vs. centralized group action

The CEO of Vodafone group says that though the company operates worldwide, the
company in itself isn’t called global. This has been the tone which is set to further prove
the decentralised system it follows. Even while maintaining a strong international
presence, each country has its own company culture which helps in forming a better
connection to that country’s consumers. Also, such individualistic country management
helps in faster and relevant innovation.
3. What are the implications of AI adoption across business operations? How does AI
enable value creation for customers?
Sol:
A) Use of RPA and bots in Vodafone software program.
B) Bots can function a couple of procedures like financial institution reconciliation and
decrease purchaser disconnections.
C) Each bot had the capability of doing the repetitive menial tasks of three humans, so
that the human resource is free for better work.
D) Quicker and error free resolving of issues and execution of tasks.
E) Automation of operations & predictive maintenance
F) Tickets are raised due to issues and grievances autonomously. The networks are
controlled automatically.
G) Chatbots (Amelia and TOBi) have shown to improve the consumer relations and
purchasers are happy to get their issues resolved faster and hassle free.
H) Digital assistants like Alexa, Siri, Cortana etc. can be further improved upon by
integrating these chatbots by Vodafone.
I) My Vodafone app a digital, constant, personalised and direct connection between the
company and consumers

4. What does adopting AI imply for how human resources are organized and deployed
across the company?
Sol:
A) An important shift in how the human resources are organised and deployed will be a
shift from an incremental and long term planning to a failing-learning-scaling model.
B) With the adoption of AI, the focus of the company has shifted to more product and
consumer excellence rather than just providing a functional service, so employees
will need to upskill.
C) There will be a fast movement from judgement driven decision to a more data centric
and AI enabled insights for better segmentation, micropositioning and trend
predictions.
D) Cultural Shift from a directive approach to a more collaborative, coaching, trusting
people in the workplace so that they can work together along with the AI capabilities
to provide utmost value.
E) Digital Ninjas: Reverse mentoring to keep up with the pace of the ever changing
world.
F) Vodafone uses robots to interview candidates for talent acquisition. This would
change the hiring process which is an important part of the HR capabilities.

5. What are the implications of the firm-level adoption of these technologies for individuals
and within a broader economy and how might local workforces and policymakers
respond?
Sol:
Unemployment in Call Centres : There would be loss of jobs in call centres with the use
of chatbots like Amelia and TOBi. Though they will be really helpful in resolving issues
for the company’s employees and customers, but they will also result in large scale loss of
lower skilled jobs. Its broader implication will be bad for the job market, as there would
be a rise in unemployment as adoption of AI will reduce the need for people to do
repetitive tasks. And if more companies start shifting to technology for such tasks, there
would be an decrease in potential job opportunities and lower levels
As is being promoted by most company owners and politicians that improvement in
technology will create new jobs. But there is going to be a major shift and need for
upskilling of the workforce which will take a lor of time, this period will be a difficult
adjustment for many of the families and might not fully be compensated.
Policy makers have started understanding the impact of technology on business not in
terms of internal working but also in terms of number of jobs and incomes which
ultimately decided quality of life.
Legal issues regarding working conditions, investment in educational institutes for
upskilling of workers, protecting as many households from being impoverished is going
to be some big challenged for policymakers.