In a strategic move to advance its position in a competitive market, Launch embarked on an initiative to build AI fluency across our organization. Recognizing the power of AI as a transformative business tool, we aimed to empower all employees with the knowledge and skills to harness AI effectively. This case study outlines the challenges faced, the solutions implemented, and the substantial results achieved through this innovative program.
Artificial Intelligence has rapidly transitioned from a novel technology to a vital business competency. Launch recognized early on that AI is not solely the technical domain of developers and architects. Instead, we believe that all our consultants need to be fluent in AI. Specifically, Launch employees should know enough about AI to be able to talk about its impact, identify use cases, and make informed decisions about when and how to use AI. With that in mind, we invested in cultivating an AI-fluent workforce capable of navigating and leveraging AI to drive innovation and maintain a competitive advantage.
Recognizing the Need for AI Fluency
Before the AI fluency initiative, conversations about AI were concentrated within small pockets of our organization. Most consultants outside the technical teams didn’t view AI as something that impacted their work or their customers. Furthermore, there was a lot of misinformation and conflicting information about AI coming from popular media and even AI thought leaders.
In order to rally all employees around the potential of AI, there was a need to:
- Establish AI as a business competency within the corporate culture.
- Create a common AI-centric language across the organization.
- Overcome resistance and misinformation from media portrayals of AI.
- Enable leaders to make informed decisions aboutAI deployment.
However, existing training and resources on AI tended to be more technical and intensive than what most Launch employees needed, or focused on examples that weren’t relevant to the business problems Launch employees faced.
Our Tailored Approach to AI Empowerment
Launch tapped into the expertise of its own Management Consulting Studio team members to create a custom program to build organizational fluency around the fundamentals of AI, its impact, use cases and applications, and ways AI can empower employees.
Over the course of two quarters, Launch created and deployed an AI Ready program, including:
- Four online fluency courses and an accompanying assessment
- Rollout of an AI policy
- An AI Ready hub, serving as a one-stop shop for information about AI efforts at Launch
- A strategic communication plan highlighting AI terminology and Launch AI use cases
- Ongoing measurement of sentiment and competency levels
- A formal Change Champions network and social channels to foster conversation locally
- Program infrastructure to maintain momentum post-rollout
Measuring Impact & Success
The goal of the AI Ready program was to create a level playing field, so that all employees at Launch could be part of the conversation about AI.
With that in mind, the AI Fluency program yielded impressive results:
- High Engagement: Online courses averaged a 98% completion rate, demonstrating a strong commitment to building fluency.
- High Relevance: Survey results suggest over 90% of employees felt confident they could apply the concepts taught.
- High Intention/Application: At the midpoint of deployment, 91% of employees already were or intended to use AI in their own work.
- Robust Understanding: 99% pass rate on the final assessment with an average score of 84%.
- Measurable Skill Change: By the end of the program, skill assessments for four targeted dimensions of fluency increased by at least 20 percentage points.
While the initial course deployment is complete, the program continues to support fostering fluency across the organization. Strategic communications continue to keep Launch’s AI vision and potential front of mind, the Change Champions network continues to drive grassroots discussions, and Launch continues to build training and bootcamps to drive more application.
The AI Ready program provided the push needed to accelerate AI use across the organization.