speaker-0: Once you actually do this, once you start doing this, you can actually start creating real AI employees, which is where now you're going to really be able to free up time. That doesn't mean you have to replace people who are already working for

speaker-1: Yeah, no. In fact, actually studies have shown that people who have actually started to integrate more AI into their businesses, like actually implement it, have actually increased their hiring workforce. Why? Because it's actually making them in in many cases making them much more efficient. Yeah and on ex they're expanding. They need to they they have a need. Right.

speaker-0: Right. it also can help people feel more purposeful. When you can offload those repetitive, redundant, just

speaker-1: quote unquote menial tasks. Yeah.

speaker-0: that you have to do. sometimes that's really depleting and it is time consuming.

speaker-1: Time consuming. Right.

speaker-0: Welcome to Return on Design, the podcast where beauty meets strategy and interiors become assets that perform. I'm your host, Rachel Niederhofer, designer, investor, and builder of high-impact spaces that deliver real results. Alongside my husband, I run both a design firm and a real estate investment company, where I live at the intersection of creativity and ROI every day. Each week, I'll be unpacking what most people overlook. How strategic design decisions can grow your investment, elevate your lifestyle, and unlock the full potential of your property. You'll get real tools, proven strategies, and unfiltered conversations with industry experts who are doing it right. So if you're ready to invest with purpose and leverage design as a powerful tool, this podcast is for you. We are definitely living in a new Age here with all of this AI. most small businesses are using AI, about 75%, in fact. But stats show that only roughly 14% have it actually integrated into their core operation. Just dabbling in AI is beyond us now. Like it has advanced so much that you can actually integrate it to help alleviate. real bottlenecks and give you more time. So today I want to talk about that. I want to talk about AI on a deeper level where we can actually walk you through the process that we've gone through and that we take our clients through when it comes to integrating AI specifically to optimize your business operation. So let's dive in. I'll be the first to admit, you know, when I first started using AI, I primarily used it as a chat tool. Which a lot of people do. a question answer, maybe helping me formulate my thoughts, create some, you know, I don't know, drama.

speaker-1: Just rewarding a few drafts.

speaker-0: Yeah. I mean, it's just barely touching the surface. And then that kind of evolved into a little bit more sophisticated things, like maybe helping me create documents or something of that that nature. But it hasn't been until more recently, that we have really honed in on how to actually leverage AI and integrate it into our operation, where it is in the core foundation of how we are structuring things and getting things done that has really taken it to a whole new level.

speaker-1: Yeah, we've talked about it in an earlier episode of, you know, this AI, it is a tool. Use your tool use the tools. Yeah. And use them to advance what you're what you're doing and build stronger, you know, platforms. Build and as this as this continues to evolve, it gets stronger and it gets better. And you can actually use it to help you become more efficient in what you're doing.

speaker-0: Yeah. And the worst thing to do is to be afraid of it. you gotta embrace it. I know a lot of people are apprehensive about technology and but it things are moving so quickly that you have the ability to get ahead get in front of it and really, we've talked about, leverage it. And a good place to start, okay, is well, first of all, you need to determine which AI platform you're gonna use. Cause there's a lot out there. We specifically have used Chat GPT and Claude. Whatever you wherever you land, the goal is really pick one and refine it and stick with it because they're both sort of competing against each other. Yeah.

speaker-1: I I think a lot of people kinda dabble in this one or that one. And know, the more you use one, the more it understands how the way you're working, what you're doing. And because this is it's it's a learning thing. And y both of you are learning. It's learning what you're doing, how you're doing it, how you're viewing or what you're asking, and it's building upon that and you're learning how to use it more so you get better with it. Yeah. Instead of

speaker-0: you have to nurture that relationship, if you will, because to your point, it's learning what you're feeding it. So you have to train it and refine it to understand your narrative, to understand how you want it to position you as a brand. But I want to kind of dive into the how, the how you actually integrate this in a way that gives you more freedom, gives you more time, makes you more productive. And just the sort of the initial baseline of taking the next step. Cause I know a lot of people, you know, that can feel very overwhelming. Probably the most simple approach is I'm just going to just take my existing structure in my business. And then I'm going to have AI come in and like offload some of the work. That I'm doing. So that could look like handling some level of administrative stuff, maybe managing email responses or giving you kind of like a daily briefing. Yeah. But I propose that you need to like start even at the foundation of your operation as a whole. That should be the starting point. And like really design the structure of how you're doing stuff before you just start integrating AI because this is an opportunity for you to build a solid foundation. And it's gonna nurture the relationship, if you will, of AI understanding who it's representing.

speaker-1: Yeah. how you like who you are, what you're doing, what you're trying to accomplish.

speaker-0: The one of the best ways to start with that is start with an audit. So you can go in, first of all, you've got to be able to connect applications to whatever AI application or, you know, AI tool you're using. So there's a way you can get in there and connect applications. And then you kind of give it a briefing. Brief AI on who you are and then ask it to do an audit. So if you have a website, you could say something like, go to this website. and audit it and build out a brand voice narrative and tell me how how is it reading? How is it how is the brand being represented on the greater web? That's a great place to start.

speaker-1: Do that and then have it have it just start learning what what it is you're talking about. And when you do that, it's you're almost having a conversation with it. Exactly. With what it comes back with of okay, I see what you've what you've read and what you've come back with. Okay. What what do I like or what do I not like about what it actually said? And can is there something that I need to tweak with it? And the more you kind of go back and forth, the more it's understanding and can actually help represent or present you. with options.

speaker-0: Yeah. And then once you refine that and it brief it, if you will, start educating it about the brand at large, you can start casting vision for for it. So it can again, it's just reiterating that it has a good grasp of the company, the brand, what what you do. Then you can go in and actually start creating your org structure. And this is important for really that optimization aspect and Building the AI into the core of your operation. So it doesn't matter what line of business you're in or even how many businesses you have, but you can develop structure and even tell it who does what within your company. So if you have people on your staff, you can roll them into the org structure and develop a clear understanding for AI to understand like the formation of the business.

speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And with that, as you as you build that platform too, it helps to automate like if something's coming in, like you've given it a task to filter emails and stuff. It can help direct where something's going because you know, let's face it, a lot of times you get something in just your inbox and it's, that actually needs to go over here. It can help filter for you, pre filter. Yeah. You know.

speaker-0: Yeah. And then the next level to that was like, well, now that it understands the org structure, it can help you focus on how how to delegate things and actually create brand guidelines for your company. So let's say you have, you know, Jerry that works for you and Susan that works for you, and you've built out this structure for for the org, AI is understanding the brand, understanding what role Jerry plays and what role Susan plays, and how you can cohesively work together using AI. And how then Jerry and Susan can both implement AI and basically build out a more detailed aspect of what they do in a day and how their operation works. And really, you need to do that for every single role and person within the company. And the purpose of this is again, we are educating AI on your business. Yeah. So it's all about building that foundation. You cannot integrate it into your core operation until it understands what

speaker-1: that operation as

speaker-0: and you have to shape the narrative, or else it could represent you in a way maybe you don't. You're, be off target. And once you actually do this, once you start doing this, you can actually start creating real AI employees, which is where now you're going to really be able to free up time. That doesn't mean you have to replace people who are already working for you.

speaker-1: Yeah, no. In fact, actually studies have shown that people who have actually started to integrate more AI into their businesses, actually implement it, have actually increased their hiring workforce. Why? Because it's actually making them in in many cases making them much more efficient. Yes. And on ex they're expanding. They need to they they have a need.

speaker-0: Right. it also can help people feel more purposeful. When you can offload those repetitive, redundant, just yeah,

speaker-1: Quote unquote menial tasks.

speaker-0: that you have to do. sometimes that's really depleting and it is time consuming. Right.

speaker-1: Ninety.

speaker-0: In our design in the design business, I specifically have created this structure where every aspect of the operation has a primary employee, within the org structure. And then you can just continue to dive down deeper and deeper and deeper. So on the design side, we have that. On the procurement side, on the, you know, executional side. And we also did this similar thing for our real estate business. Yeah. But yeah, it it's it's really amazing when you do it. And I wanna preface because we're talking about it at a high level, but if you're listening and you're like, Okay, great, well, how do I actually do this? The best way to get started is you can leverage AI to teach you how to implement AI.

speaker-1: Yeah. I wanna ask it. I wanna do this. How can I how can I go do this? I wanna build this. Right.

speaker-0: Or you could say, like, this is what my day looks like. This is what my week looks like. These are the ways I'm spending my time. And this is, you know, I'd like to free up more time.

speaker-1: Where am I getting bottlenecked? Where am I getting,

speaker-0: And that's really that redesigning your op being fluid enough to understand you can actually optimize what you're doing, not just purely by letting AI do it for you, but by actually to your point identifying are there any bottlenecks? Where are these bottlenecks? How can I get more efficient?

speaker-1: And the key in optimizing anything and making it better is you have to identify where the where the holdup is, where the where things slow down, where it's not as eff where something's not as efficient. Right. Then you can implement the change to do that. But you have to you have to diagnose it first.

speaker-0: Circling back to that foundational, creating the organizational structure. Because a lot of people, you start hiring people and sometimes you don't even know what these people are doing for you anymore. that things are getting done, but you don't understand the depth and the breadth of like what they're really doing for you. And that is also an opportunity to refine processes that maybe don't need to be done anymore. Or, you know, Jerry and was it Jerry? Jerry. And Susan are actually have too much overlap, maybe they aren't understanding that they're both doing something really similar that doesn't need to be done. So building that initial foundation in my professional opinion is essential. This is also gonna allow you to maintain judgment from the human Aspect perspective. Because if you just go in there and you haven't really built out the foundation and you just want AI to start, it's almost like your human judgment hasn't created the baseline yet. Does that make sense? if I just went in there and was like, hey, start integrating things without really defining roles or tasks or scheduled repeatable things for it to do, you know, are you overleveled? Like, are you giving it too much control and not enough human judgment?

speaker-1: Yeah. you can tell it to do things, but you can also limit what controls it has and set set boundaries for really. I mean, you know, we use it a lot in looking at even even some scrubbings like I've got mine set up where it it may give me suggestions on do I need to respond to this or even a suggested response to incoming, you know, solicitation for with with work. You know? And It it does not have authority to send any response or, hey, let somebody book on my calendar for something. No, that still has to come through me. But it can say, Hey, you have these requests for these and you want to do, you know, what do you want to do?

speaker-0: I think the one of the best first employees to create for yourself an AI is like an executive assistant to help delegate and manage the things you're talking about. Yeah. Especially when you have a lot going on and like, you know, because it gives you it can create a very high-level focus your attention here. This is what's happening here. And it doesn't even have to just be in business integration. Like if you're a parent. And you've got multiple kids. Yeah. you can still create a personal assistant that can help you manage your family schedule, that can help you meal prep, that can help, you know, not just create a calendar, but actually provide you recipes, turn those from that recipe, give you a grocery list to go to the grocery store. I mean, you can just go layer by layer and actually make AI work for you. Like, So many people are playing with it on social media and creating little funny images. And, that's just so surface level. How are you going to integrate it to improve your life? I actually do have a personal AI assistant and a professional assistant created that manages both aspects of, you know, of my life as a mother. And it's very fruitful. So that's just a tidbit example.

speaker-1: Yeah, how many times have we looked at calendars and it's like, okay, what do we have today? What do we have who's who's got what and where and when? And it's like, okay, who's going who's taking this one, who's doing that? sometimes it it gets overwhelming. And then all the things with schools and use it to help give you an an an or organization, you know.

speaker-0: And on the professional side, I have created the structure that allows our human employees work alongside the AI employees too. You know, it's I don't think it's just gonna wipe out people. Although there are certain roles that it can absolutely replace. But to your point, it can increase productivity and make things more efficient and realize, wow, instead of paying this person to do X, Y, and Z. Mm-hmm. Well, we've now restructured, we've optimized their role within our organization. Yeah. And realized they can actually offload more on this section. And you really have to have an optimistic view about it because I think a lot of the fear of people who don't want to embrace it, that is a level of fear. Like that Yeah. Yeah. If I teach it what I do, then I don't need to do what I do anymore.

speaker-1: And and yes, it can it can replace some roles and stuff, but we were we talked about with with one of our investment friends, they had an employee that they were working with and she was going on maternity leave and and he while she was gone, he actually replaced her with AI. He he ha he got AI to basically do 90% of what she was already doing. So when she came back, he was like, Okay, so I've got good news and bad news. He's like, Why don't I replace you with AI? That's the bad news. The good news is what that's actually done is allow me to open up a new position for you to do more of what you something you are really, really good at. Right. And I see a lot of potential with for you. So he actually opened up in a completely new position that he couldn't do with the AI. Mm-hmm. And allowed her to run with that. And It actually gave her more flexibility to work with with her growing family, still continue in the business and build his business even higher.

speaker-0: That's power of it. It's amazing. Yeah. And what a great story to know, yeah, people are not deleting you to get off payroll, although there might be hopefully that's not the case. And it's a again, a powerful tool. Like we have to embrace this and not be afraid of it.

speaker-1: I I say that and what he what he replaced was all the what he was able to do with the AI was replace all the menial tasks that she was doing, allowing her to actually do something powerful within his organization.

speaker-0: Yeah. So if you're looking at it from a payroll or a margin perspective, it's still saving you money because you're pro you're able to produce more for the same amount of money. It's basically doubled productivity and increased employee morale. Yeah. Giving somebody something new, something to grow in so that they don't get tired of doing the same old, same old all the time. it's a win-win-win across the board. Yeah. Absolutely. And honestly, this still has this return on design perspective in terms of our process of how to problem solve. And that's how you have to look at your AI integration. Like it's there to solve a problem for you. Yeah. You may not even understand that the problem exists yet. Mm-hmm. It might just be a what's the word I'm looking for? A symptom. You might start with the symptom, like I'm feeling so overwhelmed. Yeah. With my emails or my calendar or the amount of calls we're getting or there's something that's usually a symptom and start there. What is that? And then go into what that's gonna help you uncover the real problem. And AI can then actually go to work for you and solve a problem. So instead of just using AI to help you think of ideas, you need to to understand it is a tool that can be implemented to really actually for some reason I'm thinking of a screwdriver. Okay. You can put the screwdriver into

speaker-1: Are you gonna use a handheld or are you gonna use a power drill?

speaker-0: well, that wasn't the analogy I was going with. But yeah, it's taking a whole nother level. But you could put the screwdriver into the head of the screw. But it's not gonna do anything significant if you don't turn it. Yeah. So like it might push further into the application. And so you're you're using it to a degree, but you're not using it effectively to actually penetrate and actually, you know, fine-tune the process. And that's what AI does. So again, what's the symptom that you're experiencing? Is it I need more time? I don't know what to cook for dinner this week. my kids are so picky at eating, or our schedule's chaotic, or you know, whatever. And then start talking to AI instead of just again getting ideas, tell it like, I am having this problem. I don't have enough time in my day. This is how I'm spending my my time. My problem is my kids' schedule so busy and I'm struggling with how to prepare meals. And you would be amazed if you really wanted to get into AI. Now, of course, there's all kinds of companies who can help you integrate these things. We actually do this through our consulting firm as well. So if you if you need help. But if you really wanted to do this on your own, you can connect. So many applications and learning how to get in there and actually figure out how to connect that that's that's essential. And that's true for again professionally and personally. Yeah. Even if you just connect your email and your calendar, that's a starting point. And then you'll begin to realize more and more of all the integrations that are possible in order to truly support you. And offload stuff for you. And that's gonna help again determine who's gonna own what. how should things fun function versus how are they functioning? I know what I was gonna say. The most important thing is that you nurture it. You have to continue to like nurture what it's actually doing for you. Yeah. Like I know I haven't gotten to a point where I don't have to. still go in and be like, you know what, I want to tweak this. I wanna position this in a different way or and so it's a refining process, but maybe that's 'cause I'm always trying to optimize. What's your

speaker-1: that's but that's exactly what we do is optimization and and through that it's it is a redefined, it is a tweaking of the process so that it becomes better and it becomes faster, it becomes more efficient, it becomes you know, it becomes stronger. Yeah.

speaker-0: And it can help you filter. for our real estate

speaker-1: I use it with filtering in real estate and help helping with some quick analysis deals of d is this something I really need to devote more time to?

speaker-0: I was gonna say too on the lead generation side. I mean, we do this a lot for the real estate side of things, but no matter what industry you're in, you can create structure that really helps you be more efficient in your lead search and organization and determining like which leads are actually the right leads for you, what you should nurture, what you shouldn't nurture.

speaker-1: And based on a given set of criteria that we've given it. Exactly.

speaker-0: Yeah. And from a design perspective, like you could do that for your design firm too. You know, I want I want to build out I want you, my AI employee, whoever that is, I want you to build out a checklist that how we brief, you know, or interview potential clients and what are the stipulations of what we're looking for. And How do we you know, approve or disapprove of that person being somebody that we can work with? And it's it's yeah, just one example of a time saver.

speaker-1: Yeah, helping helping to give it the the ultimate decision still I think needs to

speaker-0: Why we do. Yeah. But that to but that's the parameter.

speaker-1: But that's the parameters like you can make the recommendation, give me a suggestion, and then I can go from take it from there.

speaker-0: Right. Basically anywhere that you are lacking real systems in your business, this should be developing and maintaining systems for you. And that's really what it means for a business owner. Like it's incredible. And we're only at the beginning of what this is going to provide people.

speaker-1: This is still continuing to develop and grow stronger and is only gonna become a more powerful tool.

speaker-0: Right. So if you if you avoid it thinking, this is just gonna fizzle out, like you're hurting yourself. Your business needs to be using AI in a very intentional way. And for you as the one actually integrating AI, it's a repeatable process for you too. You're gonna continue for every aspect of your business, tell it the the same things like define the process. establish the workflow, then create a level of automation to that. That's essentially the goal. Again and again and again and again. And you continue to get more micro in that to get even more efficient.

speaker-1: Yeah, it's just it's it's like giving giving any employee just further training on what they're doing and how they're doing it so that they become a better employee for you. Yeah. You know, just just like any corporation would do and has done. Right. You're using AI in the in much of the same facet and form there.

speaker-0: And being able to create the brand control, I think is a a really valuable thing for especially small businesses. Yeah. You know, because can ensure that the narrative, the voice of all the people working for you are in alignment with your brand. And you can actually put parameters on that at large for like organizational structure within AI. So you can so What I mean by that is you can actually have your AI or your actual employees also have AI employees, you know, and have it across the organization. And that's also going to help you, if I'm being totally honest, as the business owner, because if somebody leaves, well, now you don't have to worry about what Jerry did for your company. Yeah. Because now we have it all built out. And when it It's time to ha for somebody else to step into that role or for those assignments to be rearranged within your structure or even eliminated maybe if there's redundancies.

speaker-1: You've already got you've already got the structures set.

speaker-0: Yeah. I was just thinking about the power of using AI and social media too. so many small business people, it's it requires so much time and maybe you don't have a team to help you manage that. you could totally start with AI on that. Yeah.

speaker-1: A lot of people are.

speaker-0: Yeah, they are. So really think of what you don't like to do. You wish you didn't have to do it. That's a good place to start. After you've created the foundation, after you've developed the structure of your brand and the organization. The first place to start delegating is what I don't like to do. Okay

speaker-1: Part the the parts that are slowing me down. I don't like doing this because it's just it's so hard for me to just get this down.

speaker-0: Yeah, because done right, this is going to make your life easier. It's gonna make things more productive. And ultimately it's it should be helping you make more money too. Yeah.

speaker-1: That's always a good goal.

speaker-0: Make sure you are subscribed at Real Return on Design and on our YouTube at Return on Design, where we continue to roll out content and talk about real conversations. We're not just talking in theory. Sometimes it might sound like we're talking high level, but we are talking to you about things that we actually do. We actually implement this in our own business and then help other people do the same thing. Yeah. We are real entrepreneurs. sharing our journey and sharing the knowledge that we've learned along the way so that you maybe can accelerate a little faster in your own journey.

speaker-1: So we appreciate you guys being with us today and we look forward to hearing more and seeing and seeing more with you guys and so

speaker-0: Check us out online too, audaciousdesigns.design. Thanks for joining.