Business Analytics Center, with support from International Institute for Analytics, hosted Business Analytics Think Tank Roundtable - Use and Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Analytics. This dinner event was the third in a series of regular roundtable gatherings to focus on knowledge sharing, and also serve as a way of connecting with data and analytics professionals. Over 100 business professionals from companies in and around Atlanta attended and participated.
Dr. Kristian Hammond, Chief Scientist of Narrative Science, served as keynote speaker for the event, and Trung Tran, CEO of Clarcepto and Program Manager at DARPA, served as Head Discussion Lead.
Kris discussed how analytics solutions designed using artificial intelligence could help shape our future reliance on information for decision-making, and when AI makes sense. We learned about the cultural shifts needed, and the conversations to move toward more automated designs.
After developing an understanding of Kris's talk, creating questions to facilitate challenging and thought-provoking conversations, assembling several Discussion Leads, and training them on the exercise, Trung kicked off the Discussion Lead portion of the event. As Business Analytics Center leaders walked around the room, we saw a high level of engagement, a commitment to expressing opinions and listening to others, often times through disagreements, understanding each other's perspectives, and by the end of the evening, getting thoughts summarized for the groups. The discussion portion proved highly immersive, and participants were clearly involved in the process, with animation, colorful verbal illustrations of thought, and plenty of emotion.
We ended the evening with thanks to our participants, speakers, Discussion Leads, sponsor, and everyone involved in the effort, but most of all, with the notion that this is not the end of the conversation but the start. We're hopeful that participants created new connections, learned from AI experts, and benefited from their engagement with the Business Analytics Center.