In an ever changing world, where technology’s massive strides make it urgent to decode IT, we’re excited to bring you this article on balancing competing strategic priorities in the race for leveraging artificial intelligence to drive product improvement and deliver business results.

Here’s a quote from an icon that I deeply respect:

In this newsletter:

Why The Announcement Around Apple Intelligence has Ruffled Feathers, A Strategic Considerations Case Study

Reminder - Your Input on Addressing Bullying and Toxicity in the Workplace

Why The Announcement Around Apple Intelligence has Ruffled Feathers 

On 10 June 2024, Apple announced that it is bringing Apple Intelligence directly to our apple devices. Apple Intelligence is tipped to leverage generative models to bring a smart, context aware personal assistant to every Apple device. Now, you might be asking at this point - isn’t that a description of Siri? If you use Siri however, you’ll know that the difference between Siri and Apple Intelligence is probably the difference between a letter of intent in the business world and an actual binding contract (maybe that’s an expression of hope on my part on the latter, indulge me). Siri has trailed behind compared to other voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant. An attempt to address the shortcomings of Siri, might actually be the exact reason why the announcement of Apple Intelligence has ruffled some feathers.

Apple has in the past stood as a stellar example that you can respect users’ privacy and at the same time be one of the most successful companies in the world (assessed using a commercial lens). The pressure on Apple has been intense for some time though, with the most recent example seen when Apple lost its spot as the world’s second most valuable company to Nvidia when Nividia added US $150 billion to its market cap at the beginning of June. Nvidia’s gains in the past year have been attributed to the explosion in demand for its artificial intelligence chips resulting from the generative AI boom. Read the full article.

Reminder - Your Input on Addressing Bullying and Toxicity in the Workplace

Bullying in the workplace has dire consequences for the individuals concerned and the economy. It’s something that consumes and traumatises affected employees and their families, while costing businesses and the world economy US $1 trillion each year. So great is the challenge that in 2019, the International Labour Organisation through Convention 190 required ratifying countries to introduce laws and regulations for preventing violence and harassment in the work place. While your instinct might categorize what you may have experienced, witnessed or understand as bullying in the work place as something other than violence and harassment, bullying is a form of harassment. As such many countries have, in the past five years, passed and amended laws and regulations going beyond outlawing violence and sexual harassment to also prohibit the creation of an intimidating, hostile, humiliating, degrading, or offensive environment in the work place. Additionally, the newly introduced laws prohibit acts and behaviors that degrade an employees’ dignity.

We’d like to play our part by exploring how we might leverage human ingenuity, ubuntu and technology to address bullying and toxicity in the work place. Read our previous call for input to see how you can help.

The quote below is worth repeating.