Artificial Intelligence (AI) is no longer just a buzzword; it's a transformative technology that is reshaping industries across the globe. While there may still be some hesitance around its adoption and the impact it might have on traditional business practices, the reality is that AI offers unprecedented opportunities to enhance operations, streamline processes, and unlock new opportunities for revenue growth.
The key lies not only in understanding the potential of AI, but pairing AI strategy up with a robust data strategy. Whether it's automating routine tasks, improving customer experience or optimising decision-making, AI can be a game-changer if applied correctly. However, to get the most out of AI, it is critical to not only have a clear understanding of its capabilities and limitations but to evolve the way data is collected, curated and made available within the organisation.
Here you will gain valuable insights into best practices for using AI and data to achieve your business goals. We'll explore how you can leverage them both to deliver true business value and solve business challenges in innovative ways. Adopting AI does not come without its challenges and so we'll also cover how Codurance can partner with you on your AI and Data strategy and its subsequent implementation.
In today’s digital-first world, data and AI have emerged as two powerful forces that, when combined, can create immense strategic value. While AI is often seen as the “brains” driving intelligent insights and automation, data serves as the essential “fuel” powering those insights. AI relies on data to learn, adapt, and improve; without it, AI systems are essentially operating in the dark. Together, they form a transformative partnership that enables businesses to move from reactive decision-making to proactive, insight-driven action.
It seems clear that many business leaders are thinking about AI adoption and many are even starting to see some of the benefits it can bring. A recent CDO Survey by AWS found that 80% of CDOs agree that “Generative AI will transform my organisation’s business.” The same survey also highlighted a strong appreciation for data strategy in the success of AI initiatives with 93% of CDOs agreeing that data strategy is crucial for getting value out of generative AI.
In this section we explore the relationship between Data and AI and outline the different subfields of AI, highlighting how they can help solve business challenges in different ways.
In today's digital landscape, AI is a transformative force that can reshape the way companies operate. It enables businesses to process vast amounts of data, automate routine tasks, and provide data-driven insights in real time.
AI refers to the ability of mechanical systems to perform tasks that typically require human intelligence, such as interpretation, decision making and problem solving.
AI encompasses several subfields, including Machine Learning (ML), Natural Language Processing (NLP), Computer Vision, and Robotics. These technologies are driven by algorithms and vast datasets that allow machines to learn from patterns and make informed decisions autonomously.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionising industries, pushing the boundaries of what machines can do and how they interact with the world. While AI is often spoken of as a single concept, it encompasses several distinct areas, each with unique approaches and applications.
Understanding these different areas helps illuminate how AI is shaping our future and which specific parts of AI are best suited to certain tasks.
AI’s effectiveness is only as good as the data it is able to learn from and make use of. Every prediction, recommendation, and automated decision made by AI systems is grounded in patterns found within historical and real-time data. For example:
Without high-quality, well-organised data, AI outputs can be unreliable or misleading, potentially leading to poor business decisions.
On the other hand, data alone doesn’t drive value unless it’s transformed into actionable insights. Businesses today collect vast amounts of data, but without AI to process and analyse it, data often remains an untapped asset. AI enables companies to:
In essence, AI turns raw data into meaningful, decision-ready insights that drive strategic growth.
To maximise the potential of AI, businesses need to have a well-defined data strategy in place. A strong data strategy:
Together, a robust data strategy along with AI adoption can empower organisations to move from hindsight (looking back at what happened) to foresight (predicting and influencing what will happen). This then enables business leaders to take proactive, confident steps in a fast-evolving business landscape.
By automating repetitive tasks, predictive analytics and intelligent decision making, AI enables businesses to improve efficiency and productivity to streamline processes, reduce operational costs and allow teams to focus on higher-value work.
According to the 2024 Stack Overflow Developer Survey, AI has a significant impact on developers at different career stages: 71% of beginners find AI accelerates their learning, while 61% of professionals use it to streamline workflows and stay competitive.
Advantages of incorporating AI tools in your business:
Artificial intelligence is certainly a game-changer for organisations that want to stay ahead of the curve. By harnessing the power of AI, companies can significantly increase productivity while maintaining high levels of quality and innovation. However, it is crucial to carefully manage privacy, skills development and ethical considerations, topics we will explore in chapter two.
In today's competitive landscape, organisations are constantly jostling for position and looking for that extra edge. For early adopters, AI can be a point of differentiation - offering customers new and innovative ways to interact with their products and services and benefiting from first mover advantage.
Early adopters of AI, like Amazon, position themselves as industry leaders, setting benchmarks for others by personalising customer experiences, optimising operations, and automating processes.
A Gartner research shows that general managers tend to focus on the role of GenAI in maintaining their market position, with 32% of those launching a GenAI-enabled product believing that the investment will help them stay competitive, while 25% view their GenAI solutions as a means to create differentiation in the marketplace.
AI-driven automation allows companies in fast-moving sectors like financial services and retail to rapidly develop and launch new products, staying ahead of competitors by responding to market demands with speed and flexibility. It also enables businesses to deliver hyper-personalised services at scale, enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty by tailoring products and services to individual needs.
"Generative AI can create value in a wide range of use cases. The economics and technical requirements to start are not prohibitive, while the downside of inaction could be quickly falling behind competitors."
- McKinsey, What Every CEO Should Know About Generative AI
One of the biggest benefits of adopting AI is certainly cost-effectiveness. AI solutions can be used to automate back-end processes and improve resource allocation, reducing operational costs. Early adopters can reinvest these savings to further strengthen their competitive position.
As AI-based tools such as code generation and error detection mature, the implications for efficiency and innovation are immense, with the potential to revolutionise software development as we know it. Understanding how AI fits into software development processes is crucial for companies that want to stay ahead of the curve.
Finally, data plays a crucial role in any AI-driven solution. Therefore, having a robust data strategy is key. Those organisations that are embracing AI early are also having to face this too. Over time as AI becomes commoditised it’s an organisation’s data that will be the true differentiator and how well set up they are to leverage that. Early adopters of AI stand to benefit most from addressing this sooner than others.
The Software Craftsmanship Manifesto emphasises the importance of high-quality code, continuous learning, and collaboration.
AI-driven tools assist developers in writing cleaner code through automated code reviews, debugging, and optimisation, ensuring that the software aligns with high standards. These tools can also speed up repetitive tasks, allowing developers to focus on more creative and strategic aspects of software design, ultimately contributing to the crafting of more resilient and scalable solutions.
Check our e-book on the GenAI revolution and what this means for software development.
AI could well become just another tool in the toolkit to drive efficiency and productivity; rather than being a replacement, instead see AI as a way to enrich developer experience and invest in the soft skills needed to build better products.
AI supports the idea of continuous learning by providing real-time feedback and recommendations. Machine learning models can analyse large amounts of data from previous projects and suggest best practices and improvements tailored to specific coding environments.
In this way, AI helps developers achieve mastery by maintaining a balance between efficiency and thoughtful software creation, ensuring that both automation and craftsmanship coexist to produce sustainable, higher quality solutions.
Implementing AI in your organisation goes far beyond simply adopting a few tools. If you truly want to unlock the full potential of AI in your organisation—gaining agility, saving time and resources, driving innovation, and staying ahead of the curve—there are numerous factors to consider. In order to truly leverage AI to the fullest, a strong data strategy is vital alongside other important considerations such as ethical considerations, challenges such as data privacy, and the necessary skills required to ensure your AI initiatives are secure and effective.
It is also critical to ensure that AI projects are aligned to business goals to ensure they deliver a return on investment. A Gartner report from 2022 found that only 54% of AI projects make it from pilot to production.
In this section, we will explore how AI is currently being applied across various industries, as well as the key factors that will help you ultimately adopt AI successfully within your organisation.
For organisations aiming to leverage AI effectively, AI and data strategy must be integrated as a unified approach. This alignment is essential for progressing through the stages of analytics maturity as outlined by the Gartner Analytics Ascendancy Model—from descriptive analytics (hindsight) to predictive and prescriptive analytics (foresight). While data provides the raw material, AI transforms that data into meaningful insights, predictions, and actions that fuel business growth.
The Gartner Analytics Ascendancy Model illustrates four key stages of analytics maturity:
A unified AI and data strategy enables organisations to progress through these stages by providing both the data infrastructure and the analytical power needed to move from basic reporting to actionable insights.
Without a clear connection between AI initiatives and business goals, even the most sophisticated AI solutions can end up as expensive, isolated experiments that fail to deliver tangible value. Aligning AI with your strategic vision ensures that every AI-driven effort supports broader business outcomes, drives measurable impact and maximises ROI. But, where to start?
According to Gartner, effectively leveraging AI involves mapping opportunities by understanding technological options, deployment strategies, and your organisation's risk tolerance.
Evaluating AI opportunities requires assessing potential business benefits, deployment models and balancing risks related to automation, data privacy and compliance. This approach ensures that AI initiatives align with your organisation's strategic objectives, maximising both short-term benefits and long-term innovations.
When AI initiatives are tied to clear business objectives, they receive greater organisational support, clearer funding pathways, and a faster path to implementation, as stakeholders can see how these efforts fit into the overall growth strategy.
Aligning AI projects with your strategic business objectives is not just about deploying technology—it's about creating a cohesive approach that drives sustainable growth. By integrating AI into your business strategy with a clear focus on measurable outcomes, you can transform AI from a technical capability into a core engine for innovation and competitive advantage.
Implementing AI within an organisation comes with significant potential, but it also brings a set of challenges and risks that must be carefully managed to ensure a successful adoption.
While most acknowledge AI's potential, 76% of business leaders find implementing the technology in their organisations challenging. Key factors facilitating AI adoption include a well-defined strategy and KPIs, expertise in data, and dependable multi-disciplinary teams.
- AI adoption statistics Report 2024, Vention
Common challenges when implementing AI
One of the foremost concerns in AI implementation is data privacy. Since AI systems heavily rely on vast amounts of data to learn and make predictions, protecting this sensitive information is crucial. Businesses must navigate complex data regulations and ensure they have the right frameworks in place to secure customer and proprietary data, avoiding breaches that could damage reputation.
Another challenge is the integration of AI into existing systems. Organisations often face difficulties blending AI solutions with their legacy systems, leading to inefficiencies and technical hurdles. Successful AI adoption requires not just technology but also a cultural shift, where teams are trained and aligned with new AI-driven processes.
Additionally, the lack of skilled talent remains a significant barrier. Building and maintaining AI systems demand specialised skills that many organisations struggle to find or develop internally. This skills gap can slow down implementation and reduce the effectiveness of AI projects.
Lastly, there is a risk of bias and ethical concerns. AI algorithms can inadvertently perpetuate biases present in training data, leading to unfair outcomes that may impact decision-making. Addressing these ethical challenges requires ongoing monitoring and the development of transparent, explainable AI models.
Understanding and planning for these challenges is the key to unlocking AI's full potential.
Artificial Intelligence is transforming industries across the board driving efficiency, innovation, and customer engagement. According to a Forbes Advisor survey, the most common uses of AI in businesses currently are customer service (56%), cybersecurity and fraud management (51%), and customer relationship management (46%).
Here we delve into some of the top AI use cases across various sectors:
Retail: AI can improve customer experience through personalised recommendations, dynamic pricing and inventory management. By analysing customer behaviour, AI systems can suggest products tailored to individual preferences, boosting sales and customer loyalty. AI can also optimise supply chain operations by predicting demand and reducing stock shortages.
The retail AI market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 30% from 2023 to 2030
- Global Market Insights, 2023
Finance: In the financial sector, AI is revolutionising fraud detection, risk management and customer engagement. Machine learning algorithms examine large volumes of transactions to detect suspicious activity and flag potential fraud in real time. AI also helps algorithmic trading by analysing market trends and executing trades at high speed. AI can also help in driving more sales by delivering better customer service and personalising products to fit specific customer personas. For example hyper-personalised financial advisory services.
Over 30% of financial services companies use AI in product development
- Statista, 2023
Healthcare: AI plays a crucial role in diagnosis, personalised treatment and drug discovery. Machine learning algorithms analyse medical data to detect patterns, leading to more accurate diagnoses and treatment plans. AI-based tools in the future could also help to reduce the timescales for developing new drugs faster by simulating potential compounds and predicting their efficacy.
A well-architected platform is essential for successful AI implementation. AI workloads are resource-intensive, often requiring high-performance processing, seamless data integration, and scalable storage solutions.
A robust, thoughtfully designed platform ensures that the infrastructure can handle the demands of AI, enabling organisations to develop, deploy, and scale AI solutions efficiently and effectively.
Codurance's approach focuses on creating architectures that are resilient, scalable and aligned with your organisation's strategic goals. This means considering a number of key factors such as:
Without this critical foundation, AI implementations often face scalability issues, data integration challenges, and increased security risks—potentially jeopardising the success of AI projects.
To ensure that AI initiatives generate tangible results, organisations must define clear metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) from the outset. Without the right metrics in place, it is difficult to assess whether an AI solution is delivering value.
KPIs should not only reflect technical performance, but also the wider impact on the organisation. These metrics can then be used as inputs into decision making processes, for example whether to provide further investment or not to an AI project.
Metrics to measure the success of AI could include:
Operational Efficiency: Measuring how AI speeds up processes or reduces costs. AI should drive down inefficiencies, reduce human error, and automate routine tasks. Metrics such as human hours per task completed, product defect rates and production cost-per-unit, help tack these.
Customer experience metrics: Track improvements in customer satisfaction through retention rates, feedback surveys, customer satisfaction score, reduced response times or personalisation of offers.
Return on investment (ROI): Calculate the increase in revenue or cost savings directly attributed to AI. This could be reflected in increased sales, improved customer retention or reduced operational costs.
By combining strategic KPIs with strategic planning like the Lean Value Tree, you ensure that AI initiatives deliver tangible value, whether through increased revenue, reduced waste, or enhanced decision-making.
Artificial Intelligence governance refers to the frameworks, policies and regulations that ensure AI systems are used responsibly, ethically and safely in organisations. As AI adoption grows, businesses need robust governance to align AI's potential with legal, ethical and social expectations.
AI governance aims to ensure:
One of the most prominent regulatory frameworks addressing AI governance is the European Union’s AI Act, the first comprehensive legal framework on AI globally. Enacted in 2024, this regulation imposes a risk-based approach to classifying AI applications, with strict rules for ‘high-risk’ systems such as biometric identification or AI in healthcare. This regulation aims to safeguard citizens' rights while fostering innovation in AI.
It bans applications deemed to pose "unacceptable risks," such as AI used for social scoring or manipulative technologies, and places transparency requirements on systems like generative AI (e.g., ChatGPT). Failing to comply with these standards can result in severe penalties, including fines of up to 7% of global annual revenue for companies.
Highly regulated industries, such as Financial Services and Healthcare and Life Sciences, have been the most proactive in implementing AI and data governance. Financial services alone experienced an 88% increase in GPU usage in the last six months, emphasising their commitment to secure AI deployments and data protection.
- State of Data and AI Report by Databricks
The UK has taken a similar pro-innovation approach to AI regulation, emphasising flexibility and encouraging innovation. It focuses on creating AI frameworks that support the development of AI technologies while ensuring safety and trust. This includes balancing innovation with security through clear guidelines that align with international efforts, such as those of the EU, while adapting approaches to local needs.
In this rapidly evolving AI landscape, governance plays a vital role in ensuring that AI systems are transparent, accountable, and secure, helping organisations deploy AI responsibly.
As we have discussed, data is a critical element of AI projects, a well thought-out data strategy enables organisations to realise the full potential of artificial intelligence by ensuring that data is available, of high quality and used correctly throughout the AI lifecycle. Creating a solid foundation for data management is not just a best practice, it is a necessity.
The effectiveness of AI models depends on the quality and comprehensiveness of the data they are trained on. Without high-quality data, AI systems are prone to produce biased, inaccurate or misleading results. According to the Databricks Guide to AI Governance, data management involves collecting, organising and making data accessible for analytics and AI purposes. Organisations need to manage not only structured data in databases, but also unstructured data, such as text, images and videos, which are crucial for advanced AI applications.
Our Codurance AI and Data Maturity Curve illustrates how data strategy supports the advancement of AI maturity and moving from basic analytics and standardised reporting to predictive insights and proactive decision-making. A strong data strategy enables organisations to progress through these stages effectively.
Typically, organisations have tended to rely heavily on data warehouses as a mechanism for storing their data in a structured format. On top of this, reports are generated and either sent out to the relevant teams across the business or made available via dashboards. Whilst data warehouses excel at processing and querying large volumes of highly structured data, they have limitations that make them a less suitable choice for the evolving data needs of many organisations. This is particularly true for organisations looking to adopt AI and advanced analytics practices.
These organisations, find traditional data warehouses struggle to efficiently store and process unstructured or semi-structured data such as text documents, images or real-time metrics. These are often important data points for AI applications. Data warehouses are often optimised for batch processing, making it challenging to handle real-time data streaming effectively. For many AI use cases, access to real-time data is critical for generating timely insights.
As organisations look to evolve their data strategy, careful thought needs to be given to the platform architecture and assessing whether their traditional data warehouse approach will allow them to meet their goals.More recently, many organisations have moved to alternative architectures for their data platform such as Data Lakes or Lakehouses.
Key Elements of Data Strategy
Data availability: Ensuring that the necessary datasets are available when needed. This requires integrating data from various internal and external sources, such as cloud storage, databases and even real-time data streams.
Data quality: Data quality directly influences the performance of AI models. Poor quality data, riddled with inaccuracies, duplicates or missing information, leads to erroneous predictions. Therefore, organisations should focus on cleaning, validating and standardising their data.
Data governance: Data governance frameworks ensure that data is used in a compliant and secure manner. Effective governance provides visibility into who accesses data and how it is used, which is crucial for maintaining compliance and preventing data misuse. It also enables data privacy management, helping organisations to comply with regulations such as GDPR or CCPA.
Governance is not just about security—it's about knowing which data to use, ensuring its quality, and making it accessible to the right people at the right time.
- Databricks, Accelerate Your Data and AI Transformation Executive Guide
By ensuring data availability, improving data quality and maintaining correct usage, technology leaders can create a foundation that will drive AI success. Without this, even the best AI tools will struggle to deliver valuable insights, leaving organisations exposed to operational inefficiencies and regulatory risks.
For AI to thrive in your organisation, as well as a robust data strategy you also need the right mix of talent, capabilities and resources. Successful adoption requires enterprise-wide awareness and participation, and must be integrated into the long-term strategy and roadmap.
Organisations must assess where AI can deliver the most value, whether it is automating routine processes, improving the customer experience or making more data-driven decisions.
Management must prioritise AI by allocating the right resources, both in terms of staff and time. This could also involve creating cross-functional teams in which IT, data science and business managers collaborate to ensure that AI aligns with organisational goals.
Building Capacity & Expertise
Organisations must ensure that their teams are prepared to work with AI models, algorithms and data-driven decision making. The adoption of AI is expected to significantly increase the demand for skills in various functions. According to a Gartner survey, analytics, BI and data science roles will experience the highest increase in skills demand, with 55% of respondents indicating a strong impact. This is followed by security/cybersecurity and risk management, with 49% expecting an increase in skills needs driven by AI.
Investing in training programs is vital. This could range from technical upskilling for engineers to AI literacy training for non-technical staff. Start by implementing structured onboarding programs that introduce employees to AI principles and practical applications. Additionally, internal advocates can be established within each department to provide guidance and support.
Providing ongoing training through workshops, seminars and mentoring programmes will keep your team up to date with the latest AI trends and techniques. This can also foster a culture of experimentation, where teams feel empowered to try new AI-based strategies without fear of failure.
By focusing on creating expertise, integrating AI into your roadmap and providing ongoing training, your organisation will be better equipped to adopt AI successfully.
We are a software consultancy composed of expert software crafters, agile delivery managers, and platform engineers who approach their work as artisans. By producing the highest quality code, we design the best possible product to meet client needs and contribute to overall business success.
Guided by the Software Craftsmanship philosophy, we foster a culture of excellence within our clients' technical teams, enhancing their ability to innovate. This philosophy drives us to develop robust and scalable solutions, complementing the Agile approach with technical skills and programming best practices, thus raising industry standards through professionalism and technical excellence.
When embarking on an AI journey, choosing the right partner is crucial to long-term success. With AI transforming every facet of business, the need for a reliable, capable and visionary partner cannot be overstated. Here's why Codurance can be the right partner for your AI initiatives.
Codurance is here to guide you through every stage, from assessing your Data and AI readiness to training your team, and managing the associated risks and developing well crafted working solutions. Find out how ready your organisation is by visiting our Data and AI Readiness Assessment for a customised analysis.
Scentmate by dsm-Firmenich has revolutionised the fragrance industry with its AI-powered fragrance curation platform, designed to automate the fragrance recommendation process and simplify fragrance co-creation to deliver best-in-class fragrance solutions to entrepreneurs and independent brands (SMEs). Codurance partnered with Scentmate to enhance their platform, optimising scalability, security and user experience and incorporating industry best practices to ensure long-term success.
Our involvement included refining the AI selection engine for greater accuracy and automating fragrance ordering processes to streamline user interactions. Our engineers worked closely with the Scentmate team to strengthen platform security and improve scalability, ensuring compliance with stringent fragrance industry regulations. As well as integrating industry best practices into their team to maintain sustainable growth.
The outcome? A robust, self-sufficient platform with 99.95% system availability, which enabled Scentmate to confidently expand into new markets. By improving the accuracy of fragrance recommendation, the platform not only increased customer satisfaction, reducing fragrance sample delivery from 4 weeks to 48 hours, but also set a new industry standard. Read the full case study of Scentmate by dsm-Firmenich here.
Integrating AI effectively requires more than just selecting the right tools; it requires a solid understanding of your organisation's current capabilities and readiness.
Codurance's Data and AI Readiness Assessment is designed to help businesses assess their readiness for AI adoption, providing a strategic foundation for implementing AI solutions that drive tangible results. Through a combination of in-depth consultations, technical evaluations, and strategic analysis, we identify strengths, gaps, and the specific areas where Data and AI can make the most impact in your organisation.
Our assessment is based on 6 pillars:
The output of this assessment is a comprehensive and practical roadmap that includes recommendations on tools, processes and timelines tailored to the specific needs of your business.
Ready to find out how prepared your organisation is for AI? Download the Data and AI Readiness Assessment brochure here to learn more about our approach and start your journey towards AI transformation.
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