Editorial
With the volume and velocity of announcements being made around AI features in employee experience platforms showing no sign of slowing down, it can be difficult to identify what is currently available. Below is a high-level overview of the features and tools that are on the market right now.
Haiilo: Suggested Answers in Search
In mid-2023 Haiilo launched a ‘likely answers’ feature that will be familiar from internet search engines like Google, where an answer is given instead of simply returning a link to a document or page. In this instance, an AI is generating the answer from the intranet database of content. When you look for a file, it’ll tell you where to navigate to find it, plus display the file’s results underneath for ease of access.
While helpful in theory, the feature delivers results with the warning: “generated answers can be wrong.” I’d therefore recommend that intranet teams have a simple process or policy in place on what to do should the AI hallucinate and provide inaccurate information. Employees should have a way to report inaccurate information, and the intranet team should understand how they can effect change.
The value of this sort of approach relies in part on the quality of the analytics in the background. I’ve not seen Haiilo’s offering in this regard, but analytics are in general a weak area for these sorts of products. I hope vendors will devote as much time on training their customers on how to use AI effectively to enact positive change as they do developing the new features and user experience on the front end.
Related Article: Generative AI, the Great Productivity Booster
Firstup: Profiles and Audience Targeting
The Firstup platform includes very detailed profiles pages, which can be populated from HR systems or updated by the individual, for example so they can add pronouns. What’s included in the profile is then available for audience targeting.
Once the audience is selected, the publisher has the option to let Firstup send the message to the individuals within that group. The message will be delivered at the best time for the individual, and also for the priority level of the message. This is on an individual basis, so Jameel may receive the message at 9am on a Monday in Paris, while Philippa receives it at 11am on a Tuesday in Dublin.
The AI delivery is helpful for the end-user, as it matches the individual’s behavior and helps reduce overwhelm. The AI also adjusts itself based on profile changes, so if Philippa travels to New York, the AI will adjust based on her new behavior and time zone.
For publishers this will help reach the right people at the right time, with the additional support of a fatigue rating so they know whether they have targeted this audience too frequently with messages. Publishers also have the option to manually choose when to publish too, so those who are nervous about AI can regain control.
As with any audience targeting, the Firstup AI relies on audience data being present and maintained, which can be a project in its own right for some organizations. Platforms like this would be doing their customers a service if they built in reminders to prompt people to keep their profile updated and offer an easy way to contact IT or HR to get incorrect information changed.
Staffbase: Content Companion (Generative AI)
The first example of generative AI is Staffbase Companion. Staffbase has stated it is “taking things slow-ish” with generative AI, as it is aware of therisks and conversations still happening across organisations around its usage. The companion has therefore been designed to offer support, rather than be an end-to-end publishing tool. For example, it will shorten content length, so those of us in love with our words can self-edit using AI. Any draft it provides must be physically edited before it can be published, and it will also generate data such as titles and summaries from the body of the content.
The Companion helps provide a nice starting point for publishers, while relying on them to flesh out and edit what’s provided. Publishers will also need an understanding of what’s changed and decide whether it has changed for the better. Ultimately, while the Companion will save time with initial drafts and editing content, the publisher needs to understand whether the output is appropriate for their reader. As with all generative AI features, the skills around editing (for accuracy and phrasing choices) therefore shouldn’t be underestimated and organizations must start thinking now about what skills publishers may need in the future.
Related Article: Advancing the Digital Maturity of Internal Communications
Haiilo: Embedded Prompts (Generative AI)
Haiilo includes an integration with ChatGPT where publishers can access the AI from within the post they’re crafting. The screenshot shows the editing features for existing text, which includes making the tone more or less formal, changing the length and simplifying the content. Haiilo also includes generative AI features that will create a draft based on prompts. What’s returned isn’t based on the confines of intranet or company data, it’s a direct pull from ChatGPT, so publishers will have to carefully check the accuracy and appropriateness of tone. There are security considerations here too that organizations should be discussing now, regardless of whether AI is present in the business yet.
As with the Staffbase example,publishers shouldn’t underestimate the importance of editing what’s returned.Also know the system doesn’t provide a flag or other indication that content was created using AI, so organisations should consider whether they would like to physically add a note at the end of the content to that effect. In my opinion, being upfront about AI generated content is important and I’d like to see vendors automatically add these tags to the resulting content, as well as to the back end.
Unily: A Form Approach to Generative AI
Unily takes a different approach to generative AI features. This form-like approach prompts publishers to make choices as they progress through the content generation process.
Unily’s ‘intranet’ filter in the back end will sift through results from the Microsoft AI to make sure it’s appropriate for an internally facing audience. It will also gather context from the type of content that’s being created, so if for example the publisher is creating an ‘event,’ then that context is overlaid to make sure what’s created is appropriate. Again, there is no flag to show it’s been AI-generated, and publishers will have to carefully edit the output.
When a Unily rep showed me this feature, they highlighted that the company is considering the laws, legislations and conversations on the topic of AI as it develops this tool. So this, and other products, may well change as these conversations evolve.
Like Unily, Atlas (an intranet product that requires SharePoint in the back end) includes a form approach to AI. Admins can control who has access to this tool as well as which sites include this AI capability. Plus, customers can set up approval workflows so there can be more than one editor of the generated content.
The form below includes a prompt to apply subject metadata, which helps provide useful context for the article and for the AI. The generated article looks attractive, and is well-formatted, making this a helpful feature. However, it once again is missing a ‘generated by AI’ tag and, as with the others, the publisher or an additional editor will need to carefully check and edit the content.
Related Article: Generative AI Writing Job Descriptions: Adult Supervision Required
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Interact: Language Checker
The final example is from Interact, where AI supports publishers with language choice. The feature can help with aspects like inclusive language selection – ‘folks’ instead of ‘guys,’ or ‘allow list’ instead of ‘white list’ for example. It will also gauge the sentiment of the content, highlighting where negative language might be used so publishers may choose to adjust their wording.
While these features don’t save time for the publisher, they do help to create a better experience for readers — by presenting information with inclusive and positive wording. As we all know from experience with spelling and grammar checkers, these suggestions shouldn’t always be applied — but the fact Interact flags them is very helpful. In my opinion this is a positive use of AI, supporting and complementing someone’s writing skills to make small but important improvements.
In my next post, I’ll take a look at the AI features that vendors have promised in the next six months, so stay tuned!
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