AI’ing for EA’ing

AI is the buzzword on everyone's lips these days, but what exactly is it? Artificial Intelligence (AI) is all about making machines humanly smart. It involves programming computers to think and learn like humans, enabling them to perform tasks, such as understanding natural language, recognising patterns, solving problems, and even making decisions. Chances are, you've already interacted with AI through virtual assistants like Siri and Alexa. But that's just the beginning—AI's capabilities are rapidly expanding, and we're only scratching the surface of what's possible.

In today’s fast-paced business environment, our EA role is more critical than ever, and AI is transforming this by offering unprecedented opportunities for efficiency. In this blog, we will explore how AI is revolutionising the EA role, making us more indispensable than ever.

Let’s start by asking the question: “How would your executive feel about being supported by a chat bot?”

With all the hype around AI and the things it can do, it's easy as an EA to fear that this technology will replace our role entirely. Whilst AI can perform human-like tasks, it is not a human. It can’t replicate the nuanced judgements, deep understanding of context, and human emotion that we bring to our roles. AI's responses are limited to pre-established patterns from human input, which can be unreliable. This makes AI great for transactional relationships and repetitive tasks, but not for piecing together the puzzle of our executive's mind.

As EAs, we excel at building and maintaining relationships, have highly effective listening skills and possess high Emotional Intelligence (EQ), enabling us to intuitively prevent problems before they arise. The EA community, whether in a multinational organisation or a small business, are culture carriers, often seen as the glue joining everyone. Our all-seeing position allows us to connect dots and streamline strategy, something AI can’t do with its predetermined parameters.

Unlike chatbots, which often leave users feeling unheard and undervalued, EAs can come up with unique solutions to complex problems. With this in mind - isn’t it far more likely that this technology will help us to evolve more into strategic partners rather than replace us entirely? How exciting!

We get it, AI can be overwhelming, however when broken down and understood, it can be transformative to our EA roles. Using AI, we can automate routine tasks such as scheduling meetings, inbox management or minute taking, freeing our capacity to enhance decision-making and unlock new efficiencies. Using these tools can reclaim valuable time allowing us to invest this in more strategic activities enabling us to be more ‘value-add’ in our roles. It’s just the start for AI and the potential for EAs to leverage these tools will only grow, revealing an exciting journey and learning curve ahead.

That said, we must be careful to use AI responsibly and ethically. The capabilities of this technology are constantly evolving. It is already very persuasive in the answers it gives us and there is a risk that we can become emotionally attached to this technology and over trust it. Human oversight will always be required to check the output is accurate, unbiased, and complete and we must be confident in our own skills and know how to override AI decisions if required and intervene where necessary.

It’s important to note every organisation may have their own AI tools and ways of working. Here at Baringa we’ve embarked on a Digital and AI journey, with a focus on understanding how AI works and the ethics of using it. We are unlocking various tools along the way to help our employees boost their productivity, such as Baringa Labs (our bespoke OpenAI GPT), Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft Loop. With an abundance of AI tools at our fingertips, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed, so here are some top tips for successfully integrating AI within your role.

1. Adopt the right tools for you: Choose AI tools that align with your specific needs and workflows.
2. Continue to learn and upskill: Stay updated with the latest AI advancements and best practices.
3. Community engagement: Join EA communities both internally and externally to share insights and learn from peers who are also leveraging AI. We have just launched our EA AI Working Group. 

To help you on your digital and AI journey, we thought it would be useful to signpost some of the most used tools in the current market, check out this article listing the 10 Best AI Tools for Executive Assistants in 2024.

So, there you have it, a quick dive into the world of AI. By the time you’re reading this, there will likely be even more incredible advancements, highlighting the astonishing growth of this technology. Our goal with this blog is to get you excited about the future of your job with AI by your side. Let’s embrace AI, not fear it.

About the authors:

Charlotte is a Senior EA and has been with Baringa for three and a half years, supporting our Government Team as well as managing a team of six EAs. When not busy leading the EA Things Core Team and exploring this new digital and AI journey, Charlotte is training for the London Marathon which is fast approaching!

Fran is EA to three Partners working in the Government sector and has just celebrated her first year working at Baringa. When not busy dreaming up new ideas for the EA Things blog, she loves nothing more than having fun with her two kids, husband and Coco the Cockapoo.