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How AI Will Augment Human Creativity

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The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has been met with mixed reviews. Many esteemed technology enthusiasts have sounded blaring alarm bells. The late Stephen Hawking declared that AI could be the “worst event in the history of our civilization”. Elon Musk has reverberated similar sentiments--"AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization."

It’s hard to dispute the inevitable imminent slaughter of jobs, especially those that involve rote work and highly repetitive actions. A recent report by McKinsey predicted that AI will replace 75-375 million jobs (3-14% of the global workforce) by 2030. The question of whether or not an “AI apocalypse” threatens human creativity, however, is much more contentious. Indeed, AI technologies have already made an impact on creative disciplines. IBM’s Watson, for example, has already produced an AI-generated sci-fi movie trailer for 20th Century Fox, discovered and invented cooking recipes, and created thousands of ads for Toyota.

Yet, while AI technologies can exhibit some creative prowess, they are unable to replace higher-order levels of creativity. A recent PwC survey sheds light on this reality. Most US consumers and business decision makers are confident that AI will eventually be able to achieve the following creative accomplishments:

  • Make a top 100 Billboard song
  • Create a piece of art that is worth over $100,000
  • Write a hit TV series.

However, consumers and business decision makers are less optimistic about AI's potential to create truly top-notch award-winning work. They are least optimistic that AI will be able to accomplish the following:

  • Author a New York Times bestseller
  • Write a movie that wins an Oscar
  • Win a Pulitzer Prize for journalism

For the time being, it seems top-drawer creativity is a talent reserved for humans. Rather than threatening to supersede the most creative human pursuits, AI will augment our creative capabilities.

Incentivizing creativity

When it comes to raw intelligence, AI is a great equalizer. No longer do individuals require a high-level quantitative academic degree to access, analyze, and digest huge volumes of data instantly. The competitive advantage that’s historically been tied to high IQ levels has decreased in importance as AI has, and will continue to, level the intellectual playing field.

As the relative importance of IQ has declined, creativity and imagination have gained value and esteem. A 2016 World Economic Forum report concluded that creativity will be the 3rd most important skill in the workplace on 2020, vaulting in importance from 10th position in 2015. Creativity is clearly the skill of the future.

As we enter the age of AI, our great distinguishing ability will be creativity. A PwC report explains, "The rise of artificial intelligence is driving a new shift in value creation focused on sentiments more intrinsic to the human experience: thinking, creativity and problem-solving.” Creative expert and anthropologist Dr. Michael Bloomfield envisions tomorrow's new reality, “The typical CV or resume just five years from now might look very different. Your experience and competence will count for a whole lot less if a computer program that’s just been released can do most of your work at a fraction of the cost...You might want to say where you got your creativity training, what level you reached and what creative ideas you’ve had as a result – forget waffling on about being able to think outside the box, you’ll have to actually show some evidence of it. Maybe you’ll even have a ‘creative IQ’ score to point to – hopefully one to boast about.”

As increased value is placed on creativity and the trait becomes our best defense against obsolescence by AI, the workplace will increasingly reward creative valor. As we're incentivized and rewarded for creativity, it’s inevitable that we will double down on our efforts to enhance our own imaginative and original thought processes. Given that research has shown that creativity can be learned, it’s only a matter of time before we see soaring levels of creativity transpire.

Creating an environment that optimizes creative output

One of creativity’s worst enemies is ourselves. When our cognitive load--the amount of information in our working memory--is overwhelmed, our creative aptitude is impaired.  A study published in Psychological Science found that individuals who exhibit the highest cognitive loads are least creative, whereas individuals with the lowest cognitive loads are most creative. When our mind is too encumbered by mental taxation, we’re less likely to seek out novelty. Creativity cannot be accomplished by brute force; it requires a specific breeding ground.

AI makes for an environment that fuels creativity. With the capabilities to handle the repetitive and deterministic activities that consume the majority of our current days, AI mentally liberates us to engage in creative pursuits. Scientific evidence has revealed that the parts of our brain responsible for creativity are only activated when the frequently used parts of our brains are deactivated.

Consider the fact that sales reps can spend up to 80% of their time qualifying leads and only 20% closing deals. AI technologies are able to qualify leads for sales reps, enabling sales reps to divert more of their focus to closing deals with customers. Their creative engines begin to buzz as a result. The best sales pitches are creative ones where sales reps differentiate themselves from competitors and leave a lasting impression. AI assistants will schedule our appointments for us, surface only the emails that we need to respond to, and prioritize our tasks. We'll be less likely to thumb out text messages while in meetings and engage in other acts of multitasking that deplete the oxygenated glucose levels in our brain. In effect, our potential for creativity will soar to new heights.

Increasing our creative output

When it comes to AI, we’ve reached a critical inflection point. In years past, we’ve built advanced analytics frameworks to analyze large volumes of data more quickly and more accurately than can be achieved by humans. We’ve explicitly programmed machines to perform select tasks. In doing so, we've gained predictive power to forecast future outcomes. We now have answers to key questions. Which customers are most likely to purchase my product? How much revenue can I expect to gain from this customer? Which product is this customer most likely to purchase next?

While predictive power is valuable, it leaves little room for creative thought. We're told the most likely outcomes and are forced to react in a largely calculative manner. We pursue the customers who exhibit the highest buying propensities. We focus on the customers most likely to generate the most revenue. And we recommend specific products to customers, often without sufficient justification. With AI advancements, we'll be able to shift from predictive to prescriptive intelligence. Because AI is able to simulate and learn from an infinite body of potential outcomes, it gives more context to the predictive recommendations we've blindly followed in the past. It helps us answer the more difficult question: "why?". Why is this customer most likely to purchase my product? Why is customer X worth more than customer Y? Why is this tier of products best suited for this customer?

Armed with an understanding of the “why” behind the data, the sky's the limit. We're empowered to engage in creative thought. Because we have much more insight, a lot of guesswork is eliminated. Instead of merely telling customers what they should do, a sales rep is able to explain why it's in the customer's best interest to do it. We're given more insight to creatively explore which sales script will resonate most strongly with each customer and which marketing messaging will drive the greatest levels of engagement. Perhaps most important, we're able to deeply personalize sales and marketing content, an endeavor that only 31% of marketing professionals believe they’re effective at (despite 74% believing it has a strong impact on advancing customer relationships). Prescriptive intelligence ignites our creativity and imagination. It’s ours for the taking.

While AI has enormous potential to help us reach our creative potential, 75% of people believe they are not living up to their creative potential. In order to most effectively future-proof our brain from AI, we must fixate on enhancing our creative capacities and abilities. We’ve been focusing on whether AI will overtake humans. Instead, we ought to focus on determining how to work together with AI in such a way that a way that the whole is greater than the sum of the individual parts. With the right perspective, AI will amplify and augment our creative potential and ensure that Bill Gates is correct in declaring, AI will make our lives “more productive and creative'”.

 

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