How GenAI is breaking down silos to reshape businesses

One of the biggest challenges for businesses today is having disconnected and disparate systems. Platforms for functions such as ERP, finance and CRM are not connected. Data is held in separate silos, it's not easy to access, and there's no single source of truth. When you don't have a connected flow, you create technical debt: it's inefficient and expensive.

GenAI-powered platforms are bridging these gaps. By embedding AI into more familiar tools, organisations can leverage new technologies quickly without a steep learning curve for staff and extensive training. CRM can be used out of Excel, or an invoice can be sent into ERP via Teams. We call this "invisible systems". This kind of seamless integration reduces friction and makes adoption easy.

GenAI is also helping businesses move faster. One sizeable US-based insurance company had a queue-based system for claims. It was about a 20-minute process, and they were doing around 15,000 claims a day. If a data mismatch held up a claim, it would go into an exception queue, where it then took 30-40 minutes for staff to hunt for matching data points, update the claim and resubmit it to the original queue.

AI was introduced to handle this: not only to find the correct data and update the claim but also to update it in the back-office systems. Typically, if one claim had an issue, multiple others would have the same issue. But queue agents would just be working on them individually.

With AI, similar broken claims could be bulk reassessed and fixed. It reduced the processing time from around 30 minutes to 15 seconds. For the first time in the company's history, the queues would actually be empty. And the people originally running them could be deployed to other tasks.

In another example, a major consumer packaged goods company wanted to standardise all the POS (point of sale) systems it used worldwide. Replacing thousands of POS systems wasn't feasible in terms of cost and risk. Instead, it leveraged AI to build a data mapping and migration factory, enabling it to normalise data from multiple POS systems into a single finance platform. Before AI, this kind of data mapping and conversion would have taken up to six weeks, but with AI, it took just days.
 

Building better customer connections

But GenAI isn't just about making things faster or cheaper; it's also about improving them. Businesses have long dreamed of creating a seamless customer journey where everything feels connected, from the first time a customer browses a product to post-purchase support. GenAI enables this by weaving ERP and CRM systems together.

Instead of customer service reps having to dig through vast data repositories to answer questions, they can query internal ChatGPT-like bots in natural language and retrieve precise information in real time. These queries aren't limited to text but can also be voice queries, allowing teams to interact with AI systems as naturally as they would with colleagues.

The upskilling challenge

Leveraging AI effectively requires upskilling, but GenAI can also assist with that. We've used it to accelerate training that previously involved hours and hours of modules and recorded content. We're now using OpenAI as a model to be an academic hub for the team.

Instead of static webinars and lengthy documentation, we can create dynamic, interactive training modules. This also enables personalised learning paths so staff get the needed skills.

Companies that invest in proper training for AI will enjoy a massive competitive edge. Ultimately, you can deploy whatever technology you want, but you won't see ROI unless people can use it. It's also about encouraging adaptability so staff can see GenAI not just as a tool for certain fixed functions but as a way to innovate and try it on new tasks and processes.

At its core, GenAI is about more than just doing things faster or cheaper. It's about rethinking what's possible. Businesses ready to embrace that will find themselves surviving and thriving in this new era.

Because this is the key thing about GenAI, it's not just a technological breakthrough.

It's a mindset shift: a new way of thinking about what's possible in business and beyond.