Beyond productivity: How AI can create real social impact

AI adoption has become synonymous with working faster and growing profits for a majority of businesses. But, some organisations are asking a different question: Can AI also help people who are often left behind, and can that impact be measured?

That was the focus of the latest episode of Mint’s All About AI, hosted by Abhishek Singh, Associate Editor, LiveMint. The panel brought together Sunya Norman, SVP, Impact at Salesforce, Ram Kolavennu, CEO of Foundation for Excellence and Shashanka Kundu, Director of Product at Udhyam Learning Foundation.

Giving non-profits the same tools as big companies

Norman said trust sits at the centre of Salesforce’s AI work, alongside ethics, data protection and sustainability. The company also runs a ‘1-1-1 model’ that commits 1% of its equity, 1% of employee time and 1% of its product to charitable causes. It began 27 years ago, on the company’s first day.

“You can’t leave non-profits behind. They deserve the tools that Fortune 500 companies use every day,” Norman said. She also spoke about promising uses in India, such as helping farmers with weather and crop data.

From scholarship to first job in one generation

Foundation for Excellence helps students who are academically strong but from low-income families to study disciplines like engineering, medicine and law. To qualify for the scholarships, meritorious children must come from families that earn less than ₹3 lakh a year. Last year, it supported more than 22,000 students, picked from about 44,000 applications. Most of them were from rural and semi-urban homes, and many are first-generation college students.

Kolavennu said 93% of last year’s engineering graduates found work soon after finishing, with an average salary of about ₹11 lakh. Their family income when they joined was around ₹1-1.2 lakh. “The idea is to bring in a transformation in a single generation,” he said.

Livemint