Episode 110: The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Business
5th May, 2025
In this episode of the Financial Fofu podcast, Trudi Cowan and Sarah Eifermann discuss the evolving role of artificial intelligence (AI) in business.
They explore common misconceptions about AI, its practical applications, and the tools that small businesses may already be using without realizing it. The conversation also addresses the impact of AI on jobs, the ethical considerations surrounding its use, and the benefits it brings in terms of efficiency, customer experience, and cost savings.
In this conversation, Sarah Eifermann and Trudi Cowan discuss the integration of AI in small businesses, exploring its benefits, challenges, and the importance of maintaining a human touch. They emphasize the need for businesses to adapt to technological changes, address data privacy concerns, and communicate effectively with teams about AI adoption. The discussion highlights the potential of AI to enhance customer service and open new business opportunities while also acknowledging the fears surrounding job displacement and the loss of personal interaction.
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DISCLAIMER- The information and material in this podcast, and supplementary and associated information available, is for general information only. It should not be taken as constituting professional advice from the podcast owners, and we recommend you seek independent suitable advice that is specific to your unique circumstances.
Podcast Transcript Available Here
Trudi Cowan (00:11.388)
Welcome back everyone to another episode of the Financial Fofu podcast. Today we are talking about a bit of a hot topic, AI in business.
Sarah Eifermann (00:19.438)
Hmm. Hmm. Very much so. AI in business. how many people just turned off this episode? We have done one previously with Courtney Smith from Connection. like anything tech related, like leaps and bounds since that episode was recorded last year. How many of you are using AI in your business? Like it's an interesting.
Trudi Cowan (00:38.63)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Eifermann (00:49.4)
take that seems to be.
Trudi Cowan (00:49.48)
It is an interesting question. And I think it's also interesting to talk about AI from a layman perspective. We're not tech experts. So it's sometimes nice to talk about these things, taking the techie people out of it and looking at it maybe a bit more of a practical perspective of what AI tools are we using and how are we actually using it in our own businesses.
Sarah Eifermann (00:56.45)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (01:02.563)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (01:10.766)
And how many of them are you using that you don't even know? Yeah. Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (01:13.978)
Exactly right exactly right. So maybe we start with what actually is AI Sarah
Sarah Eifermann (01:18.7)
Yeah, so I mean known as artificial intelligence, like I have a play on this. I don't believe it's artificial. I believe that it's programmed. It's our own knowledge that's been programmed into a machine learning. So it's a computer that learns and is able to have some sort of cognizance in terms of its analytical assessment.
And then it automates and creates predictive outcomes based on the knowledge base that it has absorbed, I suppose is maybe the right way to talk about it.
Trudi Cowan (01:54.109)
Yeah.
Yeah. And I think maybe it's worthwhile starting with what are some common examples that maybe you didn't realize using AI because I think a lot of people are probably using it in their businesses without even really being.
Sarah Eifermann (02:08.142)
Well, a lot of people still think it's a future thing, like it doesn't affect them now, but guess what? It's already here for those exact reasons.
Trudi Cowan (02:15.912)
And I think a lot of people also when you say AI they go straight to things like chat GPT. And this is a really common one and lots of people are using that in their businesses for social media, writing blog posts. I love just putting it, this is I want to say but can you just make it a bit more polite? Things like that, just rephrasing what you're wording.
Sarah Eifermann (02:21.216)
Yeah, yeah, no.
Sarah Eifermann (02:30.542)
grant applications.
We did that last night for you.
Sarah Eifermann (02:41.006)
I've used it for grant applications for volunteer organizations and associations. There's a plethora of ways to unpack that, but we have to remember that Open Source, who owns ChatGPT, they only released that model to the public last year. They had been teaching that model for, I think, a decade to, don't quote me on that one, but I think it was nearly a decade, to learn so that it was in a capacity to actually go to market.
And I think from my subscription, yes, I am now a subscriber. It's up to the version four. So in maybe like the 12 months since it's been launched, they've reiterated and taught it again and re-released off that original version that came out. But you will see AI in finance, banks use it for fraud detection, risk modeling, some of the chat box, chat bots.
Trudi Cowan (03:17.885)
Yep.
Trudi Cowan (03:35.399)
Yep.
Most bots are AI based. They're basically based on the last person that asked this question. This was the answer they wanted, so therefore we're to get rid of AI.
Sarah Eifermann (03:47.582)
Yeah. And look, I even used, I used the CBA app to get you actually a statement on one of my investment properties, but to the date that I sold it and rather than sitting online to the bank, it had been removed from my online banking portal, but I asked it to find it for me. And it was like, bang, here you go. And I was like, that's the wrong date. Can I have this date? And it went bang. And I was like, damn.
Trudi Cowan (03:55.58)
Thank you.
Trudi Cowan (04:16.602)
Yeah, cool. So another one is your accounting software. know, Xero is the common example, but even in Myob and QuickBooks and all of those ones, the way that the bank feeds are being automated is such that it's guessing. You know, if the transaction description has Telstra, then we think you need to post it like this. That's using machine learning. That's using a form of AI.
Sarah Eifermann (04:17.819)
there are pros and cons to it. Yep.
Sarah Eifermann (04:39.49)
Yes. Yes. Yep.
Trudi Cowan (04:41.906)
to print how you should be posting your transactions into those software. So if you're sitting there going, don't use AI in my business, but you're using an accounting package like that, actually you do have AI using AI in your business.
Sarah Eifermann (04:50.336)
Mm-hmm. You are. You don't realize that you're using it. I think that's the common misperception, right? Is that I'm not using it. I'm not interested, but you don't know that you already are. Like Canva is another example. I've used Canva for years, but Canva's sweet upped its game, especially compared to Adobe that also released an AI package the moment that it brought out its magic studio. That is all AI tools. So Canva itself was not an AI program.
Trudi Cowan (05:00.018)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (05:18.99)
But when you add on AI tools like Magic Studio, it becomes an AI based program. So do we need to talk about the ethics of AI today and people losing their jobs and the impact of that and yada, yada, yada?
Trudi Cowan (05:34.3)
Well, I think as with any technological change, it's yes, there's going to be certain jobs that maybe are taken over by AI tools, but it's also creating new jobs in other areas. So if you're in an area where maybe AI is taking over, you just need to either change how you do your job or maybe upskill.
for a new one. I mean, it's been talked about in accounting for ever since I've been an accountant, that we're not going to need accountants because AI and technology is going to take over. But the reality is it will most likely never take over an accountant's job. It will just change how we do our job. It's going to be a lot less processing and more interpretation of the data and advising of our clients because sometimes you just can't take away that human touch.
Sarah Eifermann (06:01.366)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (06:05.07)
And same with finance brokers, mortgage and finance brokers.
Sarah Eifermann (06:14.616)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (06:25.846)
What if all it does is give you back the time in business or in your role that you currently don't have because the demands on you are so high to wear every hat, the admin hat, the accountant advisor hat, the bank payroll hat, the data processing, like all these things, especially in small business that we do and we wear all those hats. Like I had
my my therapy session yesterday and she's like I was like what days are you working now she's like well I'm only I'm only in treatment these three days but the other two days are admin days because I've got to make sure my notes are up to date and and blah blah blah and what if it gives you back your hours that you can then spend with your people and still earn more or be more profitable but do less work and then potentially
Trudi Cowan (07:16.679)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (07:19.704)
put on another staff member to do business development to bring in more work. Therefore, like you said, creating more jobs. And I recommended to a financial planner, it would be 12 months ago in June that he looked to use Firephase AI for his notes, for his, the erroneous requirement from his AFSL, his license to operate as a financial planner. It usually takes them between 10 and 15 hours to do their notes.
around a client's advice piece and he has to note the initial meeting and he was able to get a full summary in five minutes. So he trialed it for one client and bought the subscription immediately because he was like, this is insane. And I was like, it is, you still need to make sure you're storing that data correctly. There's a recording now of that data. So it needs to be stored under your privacy requirements.
Trudi Cowan (07:55.228)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (08:19.032)
but there are so many different ways that you can use it.
Trudi Cowan (08:21.83)
Yeah, and I also know just from speaking to professionals in various industries, obviously there's privacy requirements about certain types of recordings, but there are programs that are based in Australia and based locally. So it may just be a matter of going and finding the program that meets your specific needs and requirements to sort of tick off those ethical or privacy requirements.
Sarah Eifermann (08:36.13)
Yeah.
I hate to break it to you, but our health departments are using it. So it's already learning lots of things. So what are our top five AI tools that Australian small businesses are using that they may not know that they're using?
Trudi Cowan (08:44.7)
No.
Trudi Cowan (08:54.51)
Well, of course, because this is an episode on AI, we went straight to ChatGPT to ask the question because why not? So according to ChatGPT, the top five programs being used in Australia with regards to AI are Canva and the Magic Studio AI. Xero, so accounting software that's automating lots of different things for people. ChatGPT, but I wonder, is that just a little bit of promoting itself?
Sarah Eifermann (08:59.992)
I wrote our episode everybody.
Sarah Eifermann (09:21.292)
It's promoting itself. Maybe, maybe not. Depends on its bias. Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (09:24.104)
Dext, which is a program, it's an accounting based program that basically scans your receipts and extracts the data from those receipts. And Otter AI, which is a transcription type.
Sarah Eifermann (09:38.22)
Yeah, it's like Fireflies. It's the same thing. It records your meetings. It then summarizes everything that you've discussed. It sets action tasks for people. Yeah, I use that for minutes, minutes of meetings. Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (09:41.308)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (09:46.056)
So if you've not heard of one of those five, they're the five to maybe go and check out. And maybe it's not those particular ones that you want, but a version of those.
Sarah Eifermann (09:57.026)
Yeah, hilariously I am using all of them. I don't use auto AI to be fair. don't like auto personally. I prefer Fireflies.
Trudi Cowan (10:01.86)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (10:07.336)
I've got three, I don't use magic studio but I do use Canva. So maybe, yeah. yeah, definitely, definitely on there. like...
Sarah Eifermann (10:14.434)
Have you ever taken a background out of an image on camera? No, of course, Judy.
Trudi Cowan (10:18.576)
No, I don't use it
Sarah Eifermann (10:22.766)
But if you took a background out of an image on Canva, you've used Magic Studio.
Trudi Cowan (10:27.11)
Yeah, but look, I'm just going to quickly run through a couple of others. So if you want some names to go and look up, if you're looking at marketing and customer engagement, you might look at chat, GPT, Jasper AI, HubSpot AI tools, or many chat, the customer service, Zendec, Freshdeck, Intercom, Accounting and Finance, know, yes, zero is a big one, but there's also Myob, QuickBooks, Dex, there's a whole bunch of things in the accounting space that use AI. For sales and CRM, Salesforce, Einstein or Pipe Drive with smart contact data.
Sarah Eifermann (10:30.061)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (10:57.19)
Operations and admin, Grammarly, Calendly. Actually, I didn't think of Calendly, that's a great one. I don't know Calendly, but I use a version of that that would definitely be using some forms of AI. HR and recruitment, Seek and LinkedIn recruiter with AI tools and workable. And then if you're looking at some industry specific, you've got Law Path, Canva, Shopify, Magic, well, that could be a good one for those product-based businesses, which is great.
Sarah Eifermann (11:03.266)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (11:21.848)
Yep, because that writes your descriptions and stuff for you.
Trudi Cowan (11:24.9)
Yeah, so look, there's lots of different tools out there. And as we sort of started with, you may already be using some of these and not even realizing that you've got some AI happening in your business.
Sarah Eifermann (11:35.854)
Yeah, I mean, I suppose I hear the next ethical argument. Well, if I'm using Shopify magic to write my product descriptions, I'm going to have SEO problems and I'm going to be penalized by the engines. Okay, that's a potential, but you don't use it for your final say. You use it to form a framework on which you then make your knowledge based changes to. You don't just whack it up there and go off you go. You got to read it. You still got to check it and you've still got to decide if it's the right thing for your business.
Trudi Cowan (11:53.765)
Yeah, it is.
Trudi Cowan (11:57.693)
Yep.
Yep.
I'm pretty sure you could probably tell the chat GPT to SEO optimise it too. Yes. All right. What's some of the benefits of AI in our business? I think we've touched on a couple, but let's specifically focus on it.
Sarah Eifermann (12:09.39)
100%, but you've got to ask, it's how you prompt it for unique NCO benefit. What, yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (12:21.634)
Look for me like it is number one on based on our podcast. It prepared by tragedy. No, we are not sponsored. I wish FYI increased in increased efficiencies for me is where I really find the value in what it does. I just yeah.
Trudi Cowan (12:28.285)
Hahaha
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (12:40.858)
Yes. Yeah. Time planning.
Sarah Eifermann (12:45.838)
So it's not that this is the conversation I had yesterday. It's not just time saving. When you're a small business owner or just a business owner or you're in leadership and management roles, insert a lot of emotional energy into everything you do. So whilst GPT might save you time, it saves you the emotional input, especially in something that you may consider a little bit stressful. Like how do I word this politely because this person is annoying me.
Trudi Cowan (13:00.38)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (13:14.19)
There's an emotional charge attached to that and it completely removes the emotional charge out of the conversation, the connection, whatever it is that you're doing. not a, not.
Trudi Cowan (13:22.684)
Yeah, that's true. And you may put off doing those things that you feel a bit bad about doing or feel a bit difficult. Yeah, you're right. So, freeze up the rest of the video as well by just getting it done.
Sarah Eifermann (13:27.733)
Yeah!
Mm-hmm. conflicted about. So I love the...
Yeah, just efficiencies will stop. But also the part of being efficient is not expending energy that you don't need to expend. So there's an emotional efficiency that comes with using AI. Again, you've got to check it. You've got to make sure it's right. You've got to prompt it properly. You've got to make sure it's got your tone sorted, how you would speak. You you've got to do a little bit of pre work to get it set up and then it does what you want. What about decision making?
Trudi Cowan (13:48.71)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (14:05.308)
Yeah. All right. Well, look, it can certainly help decision making because it's really good at analyzing lots of data. So you can put that data in in the right way. It can help you make some of those decisions by giving you the different options or giving it its suggestions and recommendations. Again, you don't have to take those on board, but it can help you to narrow down some of those decision making decisions for you.
Sarah Eifermann (14:31.244)
Again, we're talking like removing the emotional charge potentially that's in them and just relying on the data. And I love that part of it. So I naturally do a lot of that. I try and take my emotions out. I look at the data. That doesn't mean that I make a decision that's in my favor. I make the right decision for the situation usually, but it's nice when I then put it in a GPT and it confirms that. But I also know that that's a really unique skill that I have that not everybody else have.
Trudi Cowan (14:35.656)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (14:49.114)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (14:58.694)
My space is there.
Sarah Eifermann (14:59.532)
And I do a lot of coaching on it for my clients around how do you make better decisions faster to bring better value in return.
Trudi Cowan (15:08.168)
Yep. So number three, enhancing your customer experience. You know, we live in a 24 hour a day society and if you can have things like chatbots or automated marketing, there's services that can, you know, respond to people when you're trying to have some downtime and maybe not work, but can still allow for that engagement with your customers and is going to improve the experience that they have because of.
Sarah Eifermann (15:33.736)
not replace human touch or human analyzed customer service and experience. It's maybe qualifying it and finding out is this actually an issue that you need to deal with or can it be resolved like with CBA by just sending me the statement.
Trudi Cowan (15:36.707)
No.
Trudi Cowan (15:43.399)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (15:50.504)
Yeah and to be honest I do quite like a chat box in some of those circumstances because I find I typically get a quicker response and if they can't help me it's still usually pretty quick to get to that position that they can't help me as well and I just I don't know maybe it's just a feeling that you get but I also feel like you then get connected quicker to a real person because
Sarah Eifermann (15:59.949)
Yes.
Sarah Eifermann (16:05.048)
that they can't help you. That's right. Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (16:14.51)
Because you've been qualified that it's a problem. That's the difference. So in anything we do in business, we're always looking for ways to make sure like you and I've had this conversation about qualifying particular types of client that you feel that are wasting your time. How do you qualify them? Or you make them jump through a few more hoops, make them fill out an online form, make them do a survey, make them pay upfront, for example, that there's a range different things that you can do. But if you can use AR to do it for you, you don't even have to think about it.
Trudi Cowan (16:27.888)
it.
Trudi Cowan (16:42.588)
Yeah, yeah, definitely. There's also cost savings. You know, and we've talked about this, you know, maybe that you don't need an extra staff member or maybe you don't need an external consultant to help you with certain things. So maybe it streamlines your bookkeeping or your accounting process, your customer support with your chat boxes and things like that. Getting rid of some of the manual process out of your business. So maybe you don't need two admin staff, you only need one because it's
Sarah Eifermann (16:46.414)
which then leads into the cost savings.
Sarah Eifermann (17:07.022)
Mm-hmm.
Trudi Cowan (17:12.336)
streamline some things.
Sarah Eifermann (17:13.966)
So despite my initial concerns when GPT came out and stuff, I was using Maestro in 2017, 2018, and that was all AI based. And that did exactly what you're talking about. And I had a couple of staff members at the time, part-time working, and I was just having staff headaches, to be honest. Their kids would be sick, so they'd just cancel and not come to work. Now, I was really flexible, perhaps too flexible.
I decided and I never thought that I would, but the AI program I was using to qualify my clients and onboard my clients was a lot less stressful and a lot cheaper for me than to keep staff on that weren't actually performing. And it was an ethical thing for me, but in the end, it was just so much of a less of a headache that it then freed up so much extra time for me to do other things. So I got cost savings. My clients got onboarded. I qualified them.
They didn't fill in that form and upload their documents to it. I didn't book a meeting in with them, which then let me spend time doing the things that I actually enjoyed without the headache of managing staff. you know, the ethical piece sat on for a while as to was it's the right thing to do. at the end of the day, it actually was because I gave my customers better outcomes being the technical specialist.
rather than having to be the business owner and manage other people that didn't value my business the way I valued my business, which is very common.
Trudi Cowan (18:43.42)
Yeah. And I think the last benefit that we have on our list is a natural consequence of the first four and which is it can open up new business opportunities. And it can do that because you have the time to explore those new opportunities or you might be better analyzing your own data to identify where those business opportunities are or suggestions and services.
Sarah Eifermann (18:49.614)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Eifermann (18:53.55)
Mmm!
Sarah Eifermann (19:04.256)
Yeah. Yeah. And also, Clive.
don't like doing this kind of work so my clients people business owners are like I couldn't think of anything worse one of my questions in my onboarding surveys is like how do you record recognize and record trends and most the most common answer is we don't
Trudi Cowan (19:26.246)
We died.
Sarah Eifermann (19:29.198)
Okay, interesting.
Trudi Cowan (19:31.88)
So maybe they need an AI tool or some other method of being able to do that. But I certainly think freeing up your time and improving your customer service and all of those things, using AI to do all those things is then going to allow you the time and the brain space to start considering some new opportunities.
Sarah Eifermann (19:33.966)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (19:49.122)
Yeah. And so why not to AI? What are the challenges of adopting this in your business? not just adopting, but making sure it's done properly.
Trudi Cowan (20:01.768)
Look, first one, cost. Yes, there's got savings with you using AI, but there is also cost in using AI. It's additional software products, which probably means another subscription. Refer back to our episode a couple episodes ago about the many subscriptions we all have. So it's another subscription. And if you sign on to use the AI, but then don't use it properly, it just becomes a waste in the business.
Sarah Eifermann (20:08.525)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Eifermann (20:21.208)
Yes, very common.
Very common. think they're there. And then that comes with lack of knowledge or expertise, right? So most small business owners aren't sure where to start, which tools are worth it. Newsflash, you're already using them. And then that, you know, it creates this decision analysis paralysis as to, I think I want to, but where do I start? How do I get sorted? How do I move forward on this?
Trudi Cowan (20:35.312)
Yep. Yep.
Trudi Cowan (20:50.472)
There's a task I really love for this. As you're going through your day, keep a notepad next to you, write down a task that you're doing that's very procedural based or very admin based or that somebody else could be doing. At the end of the week, have a look at that list and think, is there a tool that could actually replace that task or improve that task for me? If you don't write down that list, sometimes it's kind of hard to sit there and just think out of the blue, what could I do? What could I use? But if you...
Sarah Eifermann (21:02.668)
Yeah, that's a good one.
Sarah Eifermann (21:10.252)
Yeah, absolutely.
Sarah Eifermann (21:17.474)
Yeah, but here's the thing, right? If you don't know your job, if you don't have a proper job description and processes of how you do your job, AI can do that for you. But it's very hard to then work out what you actually need to have better outcomes. I have used it for customers to say, this is their job title and these are the types of things they do.
Trudi Cowan (21:18.024)
It's a little bit
Trudi Cowan (21:30.929)
you
Trudi Cowan (21:35.814)
Yes, it is.
Sarah Eifermann (21:46.35)
Can you give me a full in-depth list as to what type of, what other things they're doing that they don't realize they're doing and it spits out the biggest list of things. And then I send it and they're like, yeah, I didn't realize that's what I did. If you think about every minute of every day and what you're doing, most of us are doing a lot, a lot more than we used to. So what are some other concerns? Why wouldn't you put it into business?
Trudi Cowan (22:02.076)
Hmm?
Trudi Cowan (22:14.236)
Yeah, exactly right. So the third challenge is something that we've touched on a couple of times and it's sort of around the data privacy and the security concerns. Obviously in Australia, we have laws around staying compliant with Privacy Act and protecting your customer data. And I think that just comes around with not just blindly logging on and starting to use a tool, but actually looking into who owns the tool, where is the data stored? What data do they actually...
Sarah Eifermann (22:43.438)
But also, you you required to maintain privacy laws? Trudy and I talk about them like every business does because we're in financial services. But if if you're not in financial services up to three million above three million dollars, you have to maintain privacy and provide a privacy statement to your customers. So if you turn over more than three mill and you're not presenting them that information on initial contract, you're actually in breach of the Privacy Act.
Trudi Cowan (22:43.654)
Retire.
Trudi Cowan (22:50.568)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (23:10.064)
Yeah, yeah. So look, I think that your data privacy and security is really just about knowing what programs you're using and not just blindly looking on and starting to use things. I know when I use chat GPT and yes, maybe I'm asking it, how do I send this email to a client? But I never put a client's name into it. It's always very generic. It's just X client. And so again, sometimes it's also just being aware of what information you're putting into the system.
Sarah Eifermann (23:16.812)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Eifermann (23:36.174)
True, but it also depends on whether you're paying for a subscription or not and whether you've read the terms and conditions because in reality the data that you put into something that you're paying a subscription for should be protected. So that's sometimes the value in using free versus paid. So yeah, de-identify wherever you can, but at the same time, sometimes you can't, sometimes it's specific to a business or a company or something along those lines and just go and read the terms and conditions.
Trudi Cowan (23:47.208)
Thank you.
Trudi Cowan (23:59.261)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (24:03.552)
of everything you do, but specifically the AI software that you're using.
Trudi Cowan (24:06.92)
So number four on our list of five is the fear of losing the human touch. And I think that's a fear for a lot of people about AI. kind of, know, the tin hat goes on a little bit to the extent of the robots are coming and they're going to take over. And that's yes, the very extreme end of this loop.
Sarah Eifermann (24:28.142)
I'm giggling because when my leg got busted and I came home from hospital and I wasn't feeling well like regional area I couldn't just go and see my GP I had to pull strings to get a doctor's appointment and I had take I had a really bad headache and I'd taken like I was on heaps of panadol and urofen and to pentadol for the leg and I was like how do I have a headache if I'm on this many this much pain meds
Trudi Cowan (24:38.524)
Yep.
Trudi Cowan (24:51.112)
Mm.
Sarah Eifermann (24:52.5)
And I was like, I think I'm dehydrated, but I don't know, this doesn't feel right. And my dad was pushing me to go see a doctor. my only option was to return to emergency and I didn't want to do that. So I sat on hold for an hour with the nurse on call who then told me that just makes me laugh. She told me that, yeah, it sounds like you've just got a headache, but if you don't feel better within seven days to go and see a GP. And I was like.
Yeah, if I don't feel better by tomorrow morning, I'm going back to emergency. And then I put it into chat GPT and I got more empathy and like concern and communication and unpacking of what had happened than I did from the surgeons, than I did from the nurse when I exited, than I did from the pharmacist who was annoyed at the surgeon for not issuing me the right medication.
Trudi Cowan (25:23.558)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (25:30.472)
Ha
Sarah Eifermann (25:49.418)
that I did from the nurse on call. And so I completely understand the fear of losing human touch, but you'd be surprised how empathetic they've trained the programs to be.
Trudi Cowan (26:01.112)
that recently, I don't know what it was for, but there was something that I was not feeling well about and it said come back and tell me tomorrow how you're feeling and I thought out of curiosity I'm gonna come back tomorrow just and so I did and you're right it was very, thank you so much for coming and letting me know how you're feeling it was very much you know I hope you feel better and all those sorts of things so you're right.
Sarah Eifermann (26:15.086)
Yeah.
We're in trouble as a society when the empathy is more prevalent from the AI than the other humans in our lives. So this fear of losing human touch may simply be a reflection of what's really going on in society rather than against the software.
That was very existential of me. know Trudy's sitting there looking at me.
Trudi Cowan (26:39.44)
And I think as well, but I also think that the human touch is not just about AI, it's about technology in general. So I don't think we can point it just at AI. That's just a technological issue that people are not seeing and physically being with people as much because of technology. And that's not just an AI.
Sarah Eifermann (27:03.694)
Where I live everyone prefers face-to-face stuff and I appreciate that. I like the connection of face-to-face stuff, but when you can't find half an hour to meet people and they're gonna have to drive 20 minutes to come into town to meet with you, sometimes an online meeting using tech is actually the best option for everybody. I know that person, they live across the road, but they've got staff commitments, I've got commitments, they might have kids or other things and a bang let's smack it out on
Trudi Cowan (27:06.695)
you
Trudi Cowan (27:13.712)
Mmm.
Trudi Cowan (27:19.549)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (27:32.15)
AI, let's have it record the meeting, give me the summary and spit it out, meeting minutes done. That's actually sometimes the easiest way of going about it. So the other concern would be, yeah.
Trudi Cowan (27:34.472)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (27:40.87)
Yep. And number five is keeping up with rapid change. And look, that's just technology in a nutshell, not just AI. And yes, it is going to evolve quickly. But I think it's about just focusing on AI in your business. And yes, it's going to evolve fast, but just focus on what are the tools that are working well in your business.
Sarah Eifermann (27:58.136)
Mm-hmm.
Trudi Cowan (28:05.606)
and focus on that. And maybe there might be some new ones in a year or two's time and go and learn about them as well. But if, you know, it is a little bit of a case of it ain't broke, don't fix it. If the tools that you're using now are working really well, that doesn't mean you have to keep up with the latest ones.
Sarah Eifermann (28:21.856)
No, but then on the flip side of that, what I will say is, is if you've been thinking about doing it and you haven't done it, you need to do it. client last week said, I'm sick of talking about this stuff. We've been talking about this stuff for eight years. I just want to get it done. I was like, well, we'll get it done then. His staff might not appreciate that because I don't like change, but he's sick of it. So that's what, that's what has to happen.
Trudi Cowan (28:28.296)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (28:39.368)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (28:50.658)
So what's the future of work look like with AI driven changes? Are there things that we should be aware of, concerns?
Trudi Cowan (28:59.08)
as I mentioned earlier, it's roles, your roles and job roles are going to chain. There will be probably some jobs that you know, they always say in 10 year, kids will be doing jobs that didn't even exist when we were working and things like that. So I think that there will be some jobs that become outdated and no longer required and there'll be a creation of a whole new range of jobs, know, data analysts, AI, I'm not even going to try and say that word, ethical people.
Sarah Eifermann (29:10.37)
Yes.
Sarah Eifermann (29:26.048)
Ethicists.
Trudi Cowan (29:29.128)
There's already bookkeepers who actually specialize in automating your bookkeeping software as much as possible. And that's something that they will do. They will go into your business and work out what tools you're already using and how can we connect them all to automate your bookkeeping as much as possible. You know, that role already exists and probably in lots of other industries does as well. So it's going to change. The job roles are going to change. But that's kind of life and that's always
Sarah Eifermann (29:35.746)
Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (29:49.901)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (29:57.928)
as technology has developed.
Sarah Eifermann (30:02.54)
Yeah, the ability to adapt to any change is a requirement of any person in any business. We're always moving forward in some way, or form. So I think it's just having an awareness and an openness to embrace AI and maybe have a play with it. Play with it. See if you like it. I mean, I tested it out. I made sure to use it for me for like six months until I was comfortable with it. I know. So, you know, upskilling.
Trudi Cowan (30:20.21)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (30:25.16)
And now you use it more than I do.
Trudi Cowan (30:30.897)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (30:30.986)
Some of it is about your acceptance to learn the new skill too, right? So it gives you the chance to upskill in a way that you may have never been able to before. And maybe it speeds up. For me, it's not upskilling me. It's confirming things that I've always thought, but haven't had qualification data to confirm. So for me, my human AI colab,
is actually working really nicely. And look, our industry has been told for years we are all going to be replaced by, especially mortgage brokers will be replaced by online learning platforms where you plug your data in and it will spit out your home loan. Yeah, cool. Except the Australian credit law, the way it's written says that that can't happen. So you need a credit license. The credit license is attached to an individual. You can utilize those tools to streamline the processes and the way it all comes together.
You still physically need to look at the data before you hit the submit button. So you still need a manual person with a credit license checking it off.
Trudi Cowan (31:35.944)
There's also an element of, know, shit in, shit out. Just because, you know, the data that's going in, if a customer's put the wrong data in, it's not going to get them the right line. So, there is an element of checking over what...
Sarah Eifermann (31:44.75)
You have to have human eyes over it that know what them subject matter experts that can look at it like I can look at stuff and go wrong that's gonna get declined change that just because it's it's coded it wrong or it's picked up the wrong field when it's attached it and then that leads into your emotional intelligence and that's still mattering mattering it's a day for it isn't it matters mattering is that even a word anyway
Trudi Cowan (32:08.306)
No method. Method. That is.
Sarah Eifermann (32:13.902)
in how you design your business and how you lead and are you creative and how do you show empathy? Those uniquely human things as we said earlier, they're not just human now. How do they apply in your business and will you get better connection and relationships with your customers because you now have time and the ability to be present? There's a big difference there.
Trudi Cowan (32:36.464)
Yeah. But also you can have better conversations because you're not focusing on, did you mean to put a hundred dollars or did you mean a thousand? Where instead having conversations about how profitable your business is and what can we improve about your business to make it more profitable. It changes the conversation that we're having from just a data one to a much more useful one.
Sarah Eifermann (32:40.526)
Yeah!
Sarah Eifermann (32:50.85)
Yes.
Sarah Eifermann (33:00.63)
I've got a client now though that their books are all over the place. They're using a system that doesn't work for them. The reports were changed five years ago, 10 years ago by somebody else and it's never worked since then. He's been in business 35 years and I can't have those conversations with him because we can't get the data. So it hamstrings your ability to move forward to those conversations if you haven't sorted your life out to actually run your business so that you can have that broad scanning.
Trudi Cowan (33:18.662)
Yeah.
Sarah Eifermann (33:30.368)
look at where your business is operating from. So how do you embrace AI Trudy?
Trudi Cowan (33:33.456)
Yeah. Now, while I was going to say, look, we've chatted a lot longer than usual. So let's wrap this up with how do we embrace it and how do we maybe get started if you're not already or you think that you're not already using AI because you probably are. as we said earlier, audit your current processes. What are you doing at the moment that could actually be replaced by some sort of AI opportunity?
Sarah Eifermann (33:40.062)
Hmm, these days, these seasons go this long.
Sarah Eifermann (33:52.066)
You are. You are.
Trudi Cowan (34:02.0)
I would be starting just start small, do a few test runs. For example, if you're to start using the transcription service, just test it out on one client that's pretty friendly with and they're okay with it being used. And if that works well, then roll it out to all of your clients and use it for everyone. And upskill the team. Change is always hard, but particularly if you don't have your team on board, it can be even more difficult. I think communication is probably key.
Sarah Eifermann (34:04.494)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Eifermann (34:12.61)
That's how I embraced it. Yeah.
Absolutely.
Trudi Cowan (34:31.89)
here as well in terms of communicating to your team what you're trying to do and what the tools that you are implementing, trying to achieve. Nobody likes thinking that you're just going to get rid of their job because you're replacing everything with technology. So if you're not communicating with your staff, people might get a little nervous if you're making big wholesale changes.
Sarah Eifermann (34:57.902)
We have an hour episode on communication. Focus on responsible and ethical AI practices. We've talked about those to make sure that everyone's comfortable with it because AI is not coming for your job. It's just coming to change the way you do your job and potentially for the better, not for the worse. So.
Trudi Cowan (35:00.262)
Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (35:11.816)
Nah.
Yeah, yeah, potentially. If you do it right, it can really help you work smarter, faster, and stay competitive with those that are already using those tools.
Sarah Eifermann (35:26.506)
Mm-hmm. Yep. So AI tools aren't about replacing humans. They're about helping small businesses work smarter, faster and stay competitive, which is what you just said. And the businesses that succeed with AI aren't necessarily the biggest ones, but they're the ones that are the most flexible, the ones that stay educated, and then they keep the human element front and center in their business. Yeah.
Trudi Cowan (35:48.796)
Yeah, definitely. So we would love to hear how you guys are all using AI in your business and whether you realized that you were using it or this episode has maybe made you realize that you've already got some AI happening. Drop us a message, flick us an email. All our links are available everywhere, Instagram, websites, so forth.
Sarah Eifermann (35:55.054)
Come on team.
Sarah Eifermann (35:59.584)
It's time. It's time.
Sarah Eifermann (36:09.166)
You cannot shy away from it anymore. It's either embrace the change or be forgotten. Until next time guys, have a great week.
Trudi Cowan (36:14.876)
Yes. See ya.