De-mystifying AI use in your business operations

Exploring how to introduce artificial intelligence into your company’s business processes?

Humber Polytechnic has teamed up with TrAInify, an AI training group, to offer a micro-credential course series designed to show how AI can enhance your organization’s efficiency and effectiveness.

Specifically, the program shows how to use AI in five common areas of business across various industries — HR, sales, finance, operations and public administration.

Thus far, the program offers training in how people can use AI in any business, not just an insurance business, says John McNeil, associate dean at Humber Polytechnic, who helped establish the AI micro-credential program.

“The thing is, a property and casualty insurance company or broker is just like any other company,” he adds. “It’s just got three unique disciplines, including underwriting, claims and actuarial.”

The six-week, self-directed learning course runs once a week for two hours in the evening. After successfully completing six, in-person training sessions, the learner receives a micro-credential certificate, and a badge they can add to LinkedIn.

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The program encourages strategic thinking about AI use cases. It doesn’t get into the weeds of specific technologies. For example, it doesn’t zero in on specific, narrow applications such as how to use ChatGPT, Google or Gemini. Rather, the idea is to get people thinking about how they can implement and integrate AI into their own business processes.

For example, learners may be asked to build AI into a business plan or put together various different proposals for using AI in the organization.

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“We want to look at a business 360,” McNeil tells Canadian Underwriter. “It’s why we included a look at AI in a variety of different business disciplines.

“I look at it from the point of view of someone running their own business. As a business owner, I might be doing my finances or handling my HR work. There could be people wearing two or three hats in a day, right? They might handle operations, finances and HR. That is a lot. This program pushes your thinking to consider how AI can start working for you.

“So we really kind of looked at how AI can come in and complement your work and remove some of the heavy lifting.”

An analogous offering specifically tailored to P&C organizations — targeting the claims and/or underwriting roles, for example — is possible, although it’s not yet in the development stages.

In the meantime, Humber’s current micro-credential for AI training remains relevant to many different aspects of a typical P&C business, including the financial and HR departments of insurance businesses, McNeil says.

“AI for sales is a big one. That attracts a lot of different people,” McNeil tells CU, citing the program’s relevance to brokers, too. For example, AI could help brokers identify new sources of revenue, mine data or potentially support after-call inquiries. Or AI can help brokers find prospective customers and/or meet various sales targets.

“AI just allows you to work faster and better,” he says.

David Gambrill

David has twice served as Canadian Underwriter’s senior editor, both from 2005 to 2012, and again from 2017 to the present.