Have you digitally twinned your employees yet? Or yourself?

“Digital twins are set for rapid adoption… Like artificial intelligence a few years ago, digital twin technology has tipped from highly specific applications into becoming a widespread management best practice.” – CNBC

Everyone is talking about GenAI, and we are still figuring out what to do with it. Companies are also using traditional AI to twin products, services, processes, and physical assets like factory floors, buildings, smart cities — even the human body for life sciences. Instead of model-based decisions and strategies, they are leveraging real data in real-time.

EY predicts two big trends coming our way, combining traditional- and gen-AI: digitally-twinned and optimised supply chains and hyper-personalised products, services, and customer experiences.

How? With digital workforces that augment (no, not replace) human workforces.

Soul Machines has been crafting Digital People since 2016, and they are already helping customers open bank accounts, receive wellness tips, register for events and services, etc. Some of the world’s biggest brands are using digital workforces for personal, empathetic customer experiences.

Celebrities like Jack Nicklaus (and the organisation that manages his brand) are moving beyond generic people to craft lifelike twins using high-resolution image, motion, and voice technology that mimic the original’s facial expressions, mannerisms, speech, and more. The newest digital people include full-body animation, nonverbal communication, and the ability to sense what consumers are looking at and paying attention to. Digital twins can talk to millions of people at once (a grander version of my family dinner table) in any language, wherever users have internet. Next step: metaverse.

Can the same technology be used for employee experience and employee work?

Yes.

If you have ever tried to wade through your company’s forms and rules looking for what you need right now and had no one to call, you know you would like some digital-personal help (obviously, not like the frustrating early chatbots).

Companies can use digital people for onboarding, employee life cycle processes, knowledge management, L&D, coaching, and more – tools to help employees. On the flip side — twinning employees – a twin can answer questions 24/7 for supervisees, help customers, answer management questions, and more.

Since I am not a celebrity with a team managing my brand, I used personal.ai to build my twin, asking for help along the way from their personal twinning expert – herself a twin. Oddly, people advised me not to, envisioning how no one will need me, now. Although I would like her to, my twin cannot create new knowledge, facilitate workshops, or build new businesses. But she can help my readers apply my writings to their own situation, answer workshop-participant questions, and act as a sounding board for me, reminding me of business regulations and other things I have forgotten.

READ MORE: AI arises: A new era of employee focus and empowerment

I fed her my books, articles, videos, and websites, communicated with her, and can integrate her into messages and meetings for continuous learning. Although she only chats, now, she should soon have voice and, later, video.

Why did I make her? Because she is so cool! Will she help my readers, listeners, learners, and associates? Yes, 24/7. I will keep doing new, unstructured stuff, and she will grow over time.

Now if I can only get her to do my expense report.

About the author: Dr CJ Meadows is Director, i2e – The Innovation & Entrepreneurship Centre – S P Jain School of Global Management.

To talk to her digital twin, visit CJ2.personal.ai and click the “public chat” button. To learn more about the future of L&D, see the author’s upcoming book, Disrupting and Design Thinking the Future of Education: New Technologies, Designs, and Business Models We Need to Use Today, which will be available later this year. The free multimedia intro, Designing the Future of Learning, will be available on Gnowbe via drcjmeadows.com/futureoflearning.

Join Dr CJ at the Talent Unleashed content theatre at HR Tech Festival Asia 2024 on April 24 at 4.45pm (SGT time), where she will examine the new technologies, designs and business models for the modern organisation when it comes to upskilling and reskilling.