How to build a business case for generative AI

How to build a business case for generative AI 

You’ve discovered how generative AI can help you become more productive in many ways, from overcoming writer’s block to carving out more time for strategic thinking. Now, you want to share this powerful tool with colleagues — but to get your company to adopt it on a larger scale, you’ll need a full-fledged business case. To get leadership buy-in, you’ll need a business case that explains why and how generative AI (Gen AI) can boost your company’s productivity, inspire creativity and innovation, and even change the way your business operates. As you build your business case for adopting tools like Gemini for Google Workspace, here are some ways to strengthen your argument.

Identify your best use cases for Gen AI 

Gen AI can do many things, but you should build your business case around the use cases that best help your specific organization. For example, if you’re in customer service, Gemini for Workspace can help you respond to dozens of customer queries in a matter of minutes instead of hours. 

At Sports Basement, the customer service team crafts customer responses nearly instantaneously. From there, they can personalize the emails to best suit a customer’s needs and voice. This has resulted in a 30-35% reduction in time spent drafting messages, resulting in quicker response time, better job satisfaction, and higher response quality.

As part of making your business case, include examples of Gen AI success stories in your industry. You might even go to gemini.google.com and ask Gemini to research news stories about business breakthroughs where Gen AI played a role. Start by searching for success stories from other companies that use Gemini for Workspace. 

Including cost savings in a business case is very persuasive, but keep in mind that time is money, and time saved is an equally compelling argument for using generative AI. Employees with more time can shift their attention to higher-value or more-strategic activities.

Here are some examples of impactful use cases:

• Tap Gen AI if you need high-quality text, images, speech, or code — it can help you speed up processes or brainstorm fresh ideas faster. For example, Gemini for Workspace can help sales leaders customize their standard sales pitches so they can deliver them to many more prospects, much faster.

• Use Gemini to analyze data so you can rapidly glean insights. Instead of reading and digesting a stack of research reports yourself to surface new product ideas, ask Gemini to do the slog and summarize the trends it finds in the reports.

• Ask Gemini to do the heavy lifting for a “need it now” presentation. Gemini can create a Google Slides presentation with text, charts, and images. You can even leverage an existing document and use it to generate the speaker notes. 

Add specifics about Gen AI impact

The benefits outlined in your business case will tell decision-makers what you can do with Gen AI, but you’ll also need to spell out the results of the work. Highlight areas of impact around benefits like these:

Increased productivity. Collaborating with Gemini for Workspace can help reduce mundane activities (such as repetitive sales proposal development) and accelerate content creation and project planning. Employees can then focus on higher-impact activities, like reaching out to more customers or developing a business growth strategy.

Attache Corporate Housing connects corporate professionals with monthly furnished rentals. Attache employees use the Gemini “Help me write” feature in Gmail to create messages that reflect the company’s mission of providing excellent customer service and joy with every stay. In addition, the “Help me organize” feature in Google Sheets has become the team’s secret weapon as they develop plans, track timelines, and keep everything up to date in real time. 

Saved time. Freeing employees from mundane and time-consuming tasks can have outsized impact on other business goals, like spending more time on projects that grow the business. To quantify this benefit, you might consider timing how long it currently takes employees in your organization to do routine tasks, whether it’s sending customer service emails or building pitch decks. Then, as you pilot Gen AI, you can measure how long the tasks take with the new tool in place.

At Uber, Gemini is helping save time for all employees — particularly for developers. “Gemini for Google Workspace helps us save time on repetitive tasks, frees up developers for higher-value work, reduces our agency spending, and enhances employee retention,” says Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi.

Greater innovation and inclusion. In addition to empowering much higher productivity, Gemini for Workspace can open up new and previously unknown or unattainable workflows, processes, or business models. In your business case, suggest adding real-time Gemini translations of captions during meetings in Google Meet, so everyone can follow along in the language of their choice. 

Technology consultancy Thoughtworks has a globally distributed workforce that needs to communicate and build inclusivity across language barriers. Gemini helps employees at Thoughtworks translate messages to their colleagues to collaborate more effectively and build a connected team.

How to win approval for your Gen AI business case

• Identify the problem and opportunity. Outline the business challenges Gen AI can address, such as content creation bottlenecks and product design inefficiencies.

• Quantify benefits. Explain how the technology can generate content, design variations, and personalized experiences. Highlight potential benefits such as incremental revenue, increases in repeat purchases, and higher customer satisfaction. Address “soft benefits” as well, including reducing the burden of repetitive work or making meetings more inclusive. 

• Reach out to influential decision-makers. Identify the right executive sponsor, stakeholders, and reviewers, all with clearly defined roles to help smooth the path to successful implementation.

• Propose a pilot project. Identify a project where your company can explore Gen AI’s capabilities in a controlled environment.

• Suggest training on prompt writing. Skilled users of Gemini for Workspace know how to write effective prompts — the conversation starters that kick off a work session with an AI-powered assistant. To help your team develop this skill, download the “Prompting guide 101” ebook and include it in your business case.

• Include a change management plan. Change is always difficult, and there are many people who worry about how their work will change — or whether their position will be eliminated — when Gen AI is introduced. Understand and address the human impact and help users understand how collaborating with Gen AI can improve their work, and make it easier and more meaningful.