{"id":16020,"date":"2026-07-03T08:45:53","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:45:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/?p=16020"},"modified":"2026-07-03T08:45:53","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:45:53","slug":"ai-friend-of-foe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/?p=16020","title":{"rendered":"AI \u2013 Friend of foe?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Opinion by Colin Lovering, Co-Founder and Manging Director of Lovering & Partners – Sales, Business & People Performance Consultants<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I recently moderated a session with an incredibly insightful and open group of CEO\u2019s at the Business Services Industry Forum and Awards event in Bucharest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was no surprise to witness that ongoing and familiar resilience and confidence so synonymous with the industry as it continues to carve its path in this very competitive and somewhat unpredictable world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A DISTRACTION?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When supporting organisations in their business and people performance, I often refer to \u2018distractions\u2019 in the business. These distractions are often assumed to be negative ones (competition, legislation, political etc) but, in many cases, even good things can be a distraction to the core focus and priority that an organisation needs in a competitive market such as business services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AI, of course, often floated to the top within the discussions on the CEO panel and this, I think most will agree, is one of those distractions that we are not quite sure about. In the session, I described AI as that guy in the pub who buys you a drink, but you are still not sure if he likes you or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is clear how AI can significantly streamline processes and accelerate actions in operations, sales etc but our trust in it is somewhat a scary and unpredictable influence when not managed or understood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I hear CEO\u2019s confidently exclaiming the implementation of AI in their organisation, but I counter this enthusiasm with the question \u201cWhat exactly and to what outcome?\u201d which rarely gets a clear answer apart from the assumption that everyone is doing it so why not?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m sure there are AI wizards screaming at my words but please rest assured that I am a big fan of AI and its ability to transform, I\u2019m just concerned that we are losing control already.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ARE THE CHATBOTS ALREADY DAMAGING US?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s move off the general AI subject and switch to the more personal and human side of this transformation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a fast-growing array of models like ChatGPT take over more and more cognitive tasks, I wonder just how much this \u2018mental outsourcing\u2019 is actually costing us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MY TWO PIECES OF EVIDENCE!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was reading an article recently about a research scientist looking for interns and how she noticed the cover letters received were all suspiciously similar!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They were long and very polished but, after introductions, would jump to an abstract and arbitrary connection to her work. It was clearly AI generated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During Lessons at a campus at Massachusetts Institute of technology, a research expert studied the interaction between humans and computers, noticing that numerous forgetting content more easily than a few years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Basically, the use of ChatGPT etc is already showing significant signs of affecting people\u2019s cognitive abilities and the off-loading to AI can have a corrosive effect on our mental abilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

WE CAN\u2019T EVEN REMEMBER WHAT WE WROTE ANYMORE!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, I\u2019m, of course, old enough to remember the introduction of computers and the internet into our lives. The \u201cGoogle Effect\u201d as it became known showed that we are less likely to remember details when using a computer versus reading a book etc. That 80\u2019s phenomenon is resurrected today, but ten times the impact!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

REDUCED BRAIN ACTIVITY BY UP TO 55%?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I read further about MIT Media Lab, who recruited 54 students to write short essays and split them into three groups. One was instructed to use ChatGPT. A second could use Google search, with AI-generated summaries turned off. The third didn’t use technology. Each student’s brainwaves were measured while they worked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The essay topics were deliberately open-ended, meaning little research was needed for the task, with prompts including questions around loyalty, happiness or our daily life choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The results haven’t been published in a scientific journal yet, but they were none-the-less eye-opening. Those who used their own minds had a brain that was “on fire”, showing widespread activity across many parts of the brain, she says. The search engine-only group still showed strong activity in the visual parts of the brain, but the ChatGPT group showed notably less brain activity \u2013 it was reduced by up to 55%<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IN CONCLUSION<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I repeat, I am a big fan of AI and it\u2019s clear advantages but I am also fearful of the human consequences when it is allowed to run wild in the workplace and in our education system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The business services industry, like any industry, is constantly looking to differentiate with its domestic and international competitors. Those differentiators are getting slimmer and slimmer as we adopt those similar transformation models and potentially lose that critical \u2018experience\u2019 differentiator that will never go away and, indeed, may become even more significant than ever before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, before widespread implementation, we need to be 100% clear on the short-term advantage along with the longer term impact to ensure that balance takes the industry in Romania to the next level and beyond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opinion by Colin Lovering, Co-Founder and Manging Director of Lovering & Partners – Sales, Business & People Performance Consultants I recently moderated a session with an incredibly insightful and open group of CEO\u2019s at the Business Services Industry Forum and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16022,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4,19,18,3,8,5,17,317],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16020"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16020"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16023,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16020\/revisions\/16023"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outsourcing-today.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}