More than a dozen business owners and residents gained insight into AI, or artificial intelligence, and its benefits to their bottom line, at the monthly United Business Association of Midway lunch meeting on Feb. 12 at the Red Barrel restaurant.
Sharing their extensive knowledge and experience using AI were guest speakers Hector Barresi, chief revenue officer of Sextant International, and Adrian Forte, head of information technology for the Illinois Fraternal Order of Police Labor Council.
“For the last 20 years, I have been using all sorts of artificial intelligence,” said Barresi, explaining his role as a consultant helping company executives use AI to create sales and marketing plans. “I help businesses sell more, and make more money,” he said.
“I did not realize how widespread AI is,” said UBAM President Anita Cummings. “But if you want to compete, you have to understand AI and use it.”.
“You probably use it all the time without knowing it,” said Forte. “If you have ever used your phone to dictate something, that is AI,” he noted.
“AI has been around for many years, but it is becoming more popular now. AI is basically a big system that learns from existing data. It is like having a creative assistant that can help you brainstorm, write, design, answer questions and solve problems,” said Barresi.
Popular programs such as TurboTax also use AI, and Barresi said more people are becoming comfortable using that and other easily accessible “general AI” programs such as ChatGPT, Canva and Word AI, and CoPilot, which is now automatically available on Microsoft Word. More advanced programs are tailored for specific industries and are capable of advanced tasks such as sales forecasting and strategic decision-making.
“ChatGPT is very robust and proven. I wouldn’t use CoPilot if my life depended on it. It is still being tested and is not ready for primetime,” said Forte.
He also advised against using the Chinese AI program called DeepSeek, especially for sensitive customer information.
“AI makes things easier, but I wouldn’t use it for trade secrets,” agreed Kevin Casey, a commercial property owner based in Clearing.
Barresi noted that AI programs can be more useful than common search engines when seeking information.
“I used to go to Google for searches, but now I go to AI to ask questions,” he said.
While CoPilot does not save data, Barresi said other AI programs “learn” from information added to their databases by users. “These things are empty cans until you put something in. But they learn from you. The more detailed instructions you give them, the better the outcome will be.”
Barresi noted that at an AI summit in Paris last week, only the United States and United Kingdom refused to sign a landmark declaration aimed at fostering ethical, inclusive, transparent, and sustainable AI development. “Now, it is up to each corporation, each organization, to put on the brakes,” to ensure that ethics are maintained, he said. “Higher security has to be the top priority for any company the higher you go into artificial intelligence.”
When asked if Elon Musk created AI, Forte quickly said “no.”
“Research at universities started in the 1960s. AI is a set of concepts, a way of writing programs. It is like math—you can’t steal it,” he said. “Anything you think Elon Musk invented was probably invented by someone else 40 years ago.”
“You can put a lot of people out of jobs with this,” said Cummings, after Barresi mentioned that companies are replacing live customer service staff with chatbots.
“AI is here to help you with things like marketing campaigns, creating websites, search engine optimization and customer engagement. Replacing people should not be the core objective but it is taking jobs that are easy to automate,” he said.
“AI is only as intelligent as the person who uses it,” said UBAM member and business owner John Marusarz. “If you don’t learn it or embrace it, your competitors will take your job. Your clients are going to start asking if you are using AI, and will wonder why you are not.”
“It does save a lot of time,” said real estate broker Ewelina Siuta, who uses AI to craft informational correspondence with clients.
“Every company has to have people in some capacity who are knowledgeable about AI and using it properly. Rather than laying off employees, companies should be taught how to use it ethically,” said Casey, admitting concern that AI will make his son’s college degree obsolete before he gets to use it.
“These tools are saving you time, but you have to double-check the answers and make sure this information is useful,” said Barresi.