AI adoption requires personalization, planning

Bankers should treat artificial intelligence similarly to a person, said Ben Udell earlier this month during the Bank Holding Company Association spring seminar in Edina, Minn. .Udell, senior vice president of product marketing and innovation at Plano, Texas-based fintech Marquis, advised bank owners to assume they have no idea of what AI can do and to read any AI-produced materials before releasing the content.Udell said banks with current policies and procedures already have the groundwork in place to use AI. Udell has 25 years of financial experience, including 14 with Lake Ridge Bank in Madison, Wis. “The language of AI will drive transformational results,” Udell added. Banks, to ensure regulatory acceptance of AI use, should update and apply their current policies and procedures; ensure AI solutions meet their encryption and privacy expectations; and apply the same guidelines and guardrails they already have, Udell said. “Trust your people,” he added.Banks should write an AI usage policy and create a pilot team to move the emerging technology forward. Udell said banks can create a training plan using AI by asking for specifics; creating a repeatable template; refining their sample; and having a write-in section. AI is never the complete solution for a bank, Udell said, with humans playing a part in each step of the process through fact checking and reviewing for bias. He sees AI as a way to focus on prompts and everyday tasks while keeping humans in the loop. A passionate advocate for the use of AI, Udell said the emerging technology enables the collective knowledge of the internet to be tailored to the needs of an individual customer. AI platforms such as ChatGPT can make strong employees even better, Udell said, and can be used to help a bank through a challenging employee situation and write job descriptions. The emerging technology can be used to apply common assessments such as Myers-Briggs and StrengthsFinder while also writing job descriptions. Udell’s discussion came as regulators become more open to banks using AI. The bipartisan House Taskforce on AI outlined the risks and opportunities it sees from the emerging technology late last year, while calling for the United States to be competitive in the sector. The National Institute of Standards and Technology has produced guidelines to help organizations manage AI-related risks.