With AI, we can … Drive business innovation, efficiency and better decisions
The invention of the steam engine fueled the industrial revolution, paving the way for mass production, giant transportation networks and the global economy. The impact was profound, unprecedented and previously unimaginable.
Sound familiar?
Today, artificial intelligence in the workplace has the potential to be just as transformative, declared a report this year by McKinsey & Co. The global management consulting firm forecasted that 92% of companies plan to increase AI investments during the next three years.
But, as with so much in life, success lies in the details. And that’s where the campus xLab is positioned to help.
Five years ago, Case Western Reserve University’s Weatherhead School of Management launched xLab to bring interdisciplinary teams of students and faculty from across campus together to help companies solve real-world challenges by designing digital innovations for products, services and business models.
“AI is becoming pervasive across every part of life, and we have a responsibility to lead the way in how we work with it,” said Sining Wang, PhD, an assistant professor of economics and xLab’s associate director. “My goal is to help people—including our students and community members—use AI not just as a tool, but as a thoughtful collaborator.”
Progressive Insurance is among the companies that have worked with xLab and has turned to the program for several digital projects, including one involving AI.
“xLab is on the cutting edge of technology and research, and the collaboration allows us to experiment with emerging technology without affecting the business or committing major resources,” said Ray Mack, an innovation enablement consultant at Progressive. “When we find insights, we can invest more deeply.”
Last year, for example, Progressive wanted to improve its system for training customer-service agents. Using AI tools to augment traditional classroom and role-playing methods provided a way to keep pace with demand. And new hires preferred self-guided training, Mack said.
A team of six students overseen by Wang created a chatbot as an option to supplement—not replace—human trainers, enabling agents to practice what they learned with a virtual customer.
While Progressive isn’t taking the prototype into production, Mack said the company benefited because the partnership accelerated how the company develops tools internally.
To better equip graduates for new careers and meet surging student interest in those fields, schools across Case Western Reserve are adding AI courses and programs.
Students also gained from the experience. “Working with a client made the stakes real,” said Ruihuang Yang (CWRU ’24), who was the team’s lead on the call center project and is now a Weatherhead School MBA student. It “meant thinking carefully about user privacy, code robustness and long-term maintainability.”
As students graduate, xLab clients are there to welcome them into the workforce knowing their skills and ability to contribute in an AI-powered world.
“Almost every company that’s worked with xLab has gone on to hire at least one student, either as an intern or a full-time employee,” said Stefan Agamanolis, PhD, xLab’s executive director and the associate director of strategic research programs at Weatherhead School.
The program is open to undergraduate and graduate students across disciplines. xLab faculty bring an interdisciplinary approach as well, including Erman Ayday, PhD, an associate professor in the Department of Computer and Data Sciences at Case Western Reserve University School of Engineering and xLab’s co-founder.
A longtime privacy expert, Ayday focuses on the ethical use of personal data in AI. “We help identify ways to meet business goals without compromising privacy,” he said. In the case of one company, for example, students created a way to collect data on employee wellness and resilience, while protecting each worker’s privacy.
Other Weatherhead School faculty are working on AI-related academic and research initiatives as well. The school also offers a growing number of courses about using digital tools and last year launched an executive education AI certification program.
And recently, Mark Schweitzer, PhD, an adjunct associate professor of economics, joined a $1.6 million project involving researchers from eight universities to explore how AI is affecting American workers. It is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and led by Carnegie Mellon University’s Block Center for Technology and Society and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s FutureTech.
“This is an important opportunity to bring rigorous, data-driven insights to some of the most pressing economic questions of our time,” Schweitzer said. “By pooling knowledge across institutions, we can better understand where AI is helping workers—and where it’s leaving them behind.”
Illustrations by Mathieu Lacrecque
