Switchboard Connect

Every other week, I curate a few relevant pieces of AI & Automation content to help SMB execs, operators, and teams navigate these new waters.

Let’s dive in.

The big picture: Understanding your operational maturity is crucial for targeted improvements.

In a fast-changing world of tech, we’ve developed a 5-level framework to help businesses pinpoint their current state and chart a path forward.

We use this all the time with clients but thought I’d share it here as it can be a useful mental model when thinking about your own business processes and tooling.

A breakdown of the levels:

1. Fragmented Foundations: Manual processes, siloed teams & tools, no standard workflows.

2. Digital Transition: Basic digital tools, emerging documentation, teams starting digital collaboration.

3. Connected Systems: Increasing cloud adoption, some standardized processes, improving cross-functional work.

4. Integrated Operations: Interconnected cloud tools, well defined processes, clear collaboration mechanisms for teams, data-driven decisions & automations emerging.

5. Optimized Ecosystem: AI-enhanced systems, large amount of automated processes, tech-savvy/trained workforce.

What we see: Most businesses we chat with fall between levels 2 and 3 and are making strategic investment in the three core areas that advance them up the levels: people, process, and technology.

The big picture: Airtable's Cobuilder uses AI to turn your natural language descriptions into functional no-code apps instantly.

How it works: As reason #408 of why to use Airtable (yes, yes, I’m a big fan), it’s as easy as:

• Get your data into Airtable structured how you want it

• Describe your app idea (e.g., "manage pre-production for a movie")

• Cobuilder generates an application in their Interfaces < 1 minute

• Start customizing it to your liking

Yes, but: It signals a shift towards AI creating new, accessible ways of building software but the use cases of what it can build currently are very limited. Complex data relationships, automations, and syncing aren't there yet but it’s still worth a try.

The bottom line: While it may be useful to some now, as I said when I posted this, this is where AI is headed and it’s going to get really, really good. Teams will be able to build internal tools and automations themselves in hours and I can’t wait for that day!

Alphabet soup: Legacy consultancies like Gartner and McKinsey are cooking up new jargon-filled trends. Latest example: BOAT (Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies) which they say = RPA + BPM + iPaaS + Low-Code. What?

Why it matters: Abstract jargon has always been used to create FOMO around business tech trends but we've now reached peak acronym-ception, and it's crucial to recognize these for what they are: often useless.

The recipe for a tech trend:

• 1 cup existing technologies

• 2 tbsp buzzwords

• 1 pinch of fear-mongering

• Mix and sprinkle with acronyms

Questions to ask to cut through the hype:

• What business outcome will this improve?

• Can you explain it to a non-tech person in 30 seconds?

• Will it empower your team and give them time back?

• Does it scale, or is it just chasing a trend?

A simple, time-tested framework cuts through the noise: People, Process, and Technology. Align and invest in these based on your businesses culture & needs for a winning, acronym-free formula.

I made a full post about it here if interested.

Why it matters: As SMBs dive deeper into data-driven operations, I wanted to share a deep dive on Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERDs…a useful acronym 😉) as they’re becoming more popular for teams to define their data across the org as 1000s of these diagrams are created every day including on our own team.

What it is:

• ERDs visually map data interactions across organizations

• Crucial for scaling tech, process and analytics in a growing team

• Example: CRM data (customer name, email, location) connecting to other systems and triggering automations

How SMBs leverage ERDs:

1. Data architecture planning

2. Database design optimization

3. Cross-department reporting creation

4. Identifying data redundancies and gaps

Pro tip: Start simple. ERDs are bridging the gap between business users and IT teams, creating a common language for data discussions in SMBs so even a basic ERD can reveal insights leading to significant operational improvements.

This is just a primer but if you want to dive deeper, here’s a great post explaining ERD’s.

That’s all for this week.

Chat soon 👋