We recently announced that GM Business Growth Hub will be the first Growth Hub in the country to use a GenAI business support chatbot - trained on more than a decade of knowledge and insight gained from supporting Greater Manchester's business community alongside curated business support information from other relevant services and organisations. The direct link to this bot is BGH Business Support Chatbot (businessgrowthhub.com).
We believe this is the first time the technology has been used to deliver business support in this way in the UK and it reinforces the GM Business Growth Hub's position at the leading edge of publicly financed business support.
By investing in this technology, we are expanding our capability to both anticipate and respond to, at pace, the needs of Greater Manchester’s businesses and entrepreneurs. It reflects our approach to responsibly embrace the opportunities of AI to enhance the services we provide to help people and businesses grow and thrive.
We have developed our GenAI Chatbot, currently in beta mode, with a clear purpose - to help create growth and opportunity by delivering enhanced support to those who need it, when they need it, with follow-up support from colleagues and partners.
Once it is fully launched, we can expect to see ongoing improvements and benefits that will further enhance the business support services provided by our experienced advisors. We will keep you updated on progress in the coming weeks and months and look forward to hearing your feedback.
Why have we invested in this technology?
Like many organisations, GC is starting to identify and explore the potential that AI has to re-shape society around us and the benefits it can bring to how we work, how we operate and how we deliver our services.
Alongside our GenAI Chatbot, which is the first customer-facing tool we’ve explored, we are also testing AI applications across other parts of the business to help us to assess the potential impact of AI on what we do. This includes looking at the benefits it can bring to how we work, how we operate and how we deliver our services, as well as key issues we need to be aware of such as its ethical and responsible use in line with GC’s core values and culture. By taking a considered approach, we hope to maximise the benefits that AI can provide in enhancing the great work you do each day and the services we offer.
What next?
We recently shared our latest thinking with the Board, and as part of our next steps will now shape some guidelines to support our use of AI across the organisation.
In the meantime, we welcome your ideas and insight on how we can continue do this in the right way and we have set-up a dedicated AI mailbox at ai@growthco.uk for you to share your thoughts and ideas on the use of AI at GC.