How KPMG’s CMO is promoting generative AI within the consulting giant

Big companies are famously slow and cautious when adopting new technology. Digital transformation projects have foundered over the last decade as employees resist changing how they work. Consulting giant KPMG, on the other hand, has created a companywide strategy of AI adoption and integration. Americas CMO Lauren Boyman is one of the co-leaders. “AI can transform the employee experience, how we get work done and how we service clients,” said Boyman. KPMG, which counsels clients on AI adoption, calls itself “client zero” and has invested in a broad-based employee enablement and upskilling program called “aIQ.” “AIQ is our way of bringing AI into our every day, to create more impact for our clients and communities,” Boyman said. It’s a lesson for most companies regardless of size. Can you give an overview of aIQ? We are a global professional services firm with capabilities in technology and innovation. Whether you're a developer, an accountant or a business leader, AI will help you create more value. While that statement is true, this strategy is rooted in our people. Ultimately, it’s the human IQ (our talent, expertise and experience) that makes the difference. Check out the latest Ad Age events and award programs Can you share a specific implementation? GenAI can take our massive amount of thought leadership and enable our people to interact with it in a natural language way. There are many ways to use that—to prepare for client meetings, understand a new area better or produce a first draft derivative marketing asset from a white paper. We’ve realized that AI won’t replace humans—but humans using AI will replace those who aren’t. How did you end up on the front lines of AI adoption and usage? We've done a lot of marketing transformation during my CMO tenure, specifically with marketing technology, and that experience has given marketers a mindset of change and diving into technology and embracing it. When GenAI became accessible, we set up small “tiger teams” in marketing to test new technologies and launch pilots. In 2023, KPMG created the AI and Digital Innovation group, and asked me to lead one of the pillars, focusing on using AI to transform how we go to market. This was an exciting opportunity and a privilege. It helped that I was an early adopter and advocate. Would you advise other CMOs to take the reins of generative AI initiatives? I think it’s a huge asset to the marketing function. I’m encouraging everyone on my team to make the most of our GenAI assets and tools today. The company-wide transformation won’t happen overnight, but GenAI is already impacting our day-to-day work as marketers. It’s helping us generate ideas, challenge our thinking and accelerate our content output. Have you developed customer-facing marketing initiatives? One of the objectives that we had within marketing was to create AI-driven brand experiences. We wanted to share the art of the possible and enhance perceptions of KPMG. We recently introduced KPMG Skylar—an AI-hosted podcast booth. We created this interactive AI experience to help our audience understand the power of what AI can do, and just how natural it can feel to interact with it. The technology behind the experience uses a combination of AI services, starting with speech-to-text technology to recognize speech input, which is then passed through a series of generative AI prompts to ensure the response is safe before generating an AI response from Skylar. We launched Skylar at this year’s SXSW and since then, the experience has “gone on the road” to many events and sponsorships. It’s helped expand our brand perception in the AI space. Ad Age Small Agency Conference & Awards Join us July 23 & 24 in Boston Learn more here What are key learnings from Skylar? Skylar has inspired us to think of more ways to use GenAI. It’s also taught us how much interest there is in these innovations, and how we can create cool experiences for our people and our clients. Showing beats telling every day of the week. What are dos and don’ts for company-wide adoption of GenAI? Do: Recognize and celebrate people who are using AI. I've got a program for my team called Marketeer of the Month … this month I recognized our top five AI marketing users. Do: Create small working groups of big AI users who help the slow adopters get started. Don’t: Don’t be the only one on the team not using the tools. As a leader, you have to be hands-on. Once people hear you talking about how you're using it or you show up at the top of the user list, then people have no choice but to adopt it and get excited about it. 40 under 40 entries are open The final deadline for nominations is Aug. 2 Enter here

How KPMG’s CMO is promoting generative AI within the consulting giant

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