Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n As businesses rush to adopt AI, they\u2019re discovering an unexpected truth: Even the most rational enterprise buyers aren\u2019t making purely rational decisions \u2014 their subconscious requirements go far beyond the conventional software evaluation standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me share an anecdote: It\u2019s November 2024; I\u2019m sitting in a New York City skyscraper, working with a fashion brand on their first AI assistant. The avatar, Nora, is a 25-year-old digital assistant displayed on a six-foot-tall kiosk. She has sleek brown hair, a chic black suit and a charming smile. She waves \u201chi\u201d when recognizing a client\u2019s face, nods as they speak and answers questions about company history and tech news. I came prepared with a standard technical checklist: response accuracy, conversation latency, face recognition precision\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But my client didn\u2019t even glance at the checklist. Instead, they asked, \u201cWhy doesn\u2019t she have her own personality? I asked her favorite handbag, and she didn\u2019t give me one!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s striking how quickly we forget these avatars aren\u2019t human. While many worry about AI blurring the lines between humans and machines, I see a more immediate challenge for businesses: A fundamental shift in how we evaluate technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When software begins to look and act human, users stop evaluating it as a tool and begin judging it as a human being. This phenomenon \u2014 judging non-human entities by human standards \u2014 is anthropomorphism, which has been well-studied in human-pet relationships, and is now emerging in the human-AI relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When it comes to procuring AI products, enterprise decisions are not as rational as you might think because decision-makers are still humans. Research has shown that unconscious perceptions shape most human-to-human interactions, and enterprise buyers are no exception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thus, businesses signing an AI contract aren\u2019t just entering into a \u201cutility contract\u201d seeking cost reduction or revenue growth anymore; they\u2019re entering an implicit \u201cemotional contract.\u201d Often, they don\u2019t even realize it themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although every software product has always had an emotional element, when the product becomes infinitely similar to a real human being, this aspect becomes much more prominent and unconscious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These unconscious reactions shape how your employees and customers engage with AI, and my experience tells me how widespread these responses are \u2014 they\u2019re truly human. Consider these four examples and their underlying psychological ideas:<\/p>\n\n\n\n When my client in New York asked about Nora\u2019s favorite handbag, craving for her personality, they were tapping into social presence theory, treating the AI as a social being that needs to be present and real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One client fixated on their avatar\u2019s smile: \u201cThe mouth shows a lot of teeth \u2014 it\u2019s unsettling.\u201d This reaction reflects the uncanny valley effect, where nearly human-like features provoke discomfort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conversely, a visually appealing yet less functional AI agent sparked praise because of the aesthetic-usability effect \u2014 the idea that attractiveness can outweigh performance issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet another client, a meticulous business owner, kept delaying the project launch. \u201cWe need to get our AI baby perfect,\u201d he repeated in every meeting. \u201cIt needs to be flawless before we can show it to the world.\u201d This obsession with creating an idealized AI entity suggests a projection of an ideal self onto our AI creations, as if we\u2019re crafting a digital entity that embodies our highest aspirations and standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, how can you lead the market by tapping into these hidden emotional contracts and win over your competitors who are just stacking up one fancy AI solution after another?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The key is determining what matters for your business\u2019s unique needs. Set up a testing process. This will not only help you identify top priorities but, more importantly, deprioritize minor details, no matter how emotionally compelling. Since the sector is so new, there are almost no readily usable playbooks. But you can be the first mover by establishing your original way of figuring out what suits your business best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, the client\u2019s question about \u201cthe AI avatar\u2019s personality\u201d was validated by testing with internal users. On the contrary, most people couldn\u2019t tell the difference between the several versions that the business owner had struggled back and forth for his \u201cperfect AI baby,\u201d meaning that we could stop at a \u201cgood enough\u201d point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To help you recognize patterns more easily, consider hiring team members or consultants who have a background in psychology. All four examples are not one-off, but are well-researched psychological effects that happen in human-to-human interactions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your relationship with the tech vendor must also change. They must be a partner who navigates the experience with you. You can set up weekly meetings with them after signing a contract and share your takeaways from testing so they can create better products for you. If you don\u2019t have the budget, at least buffer extra time to compare products and test with users, allowing those hidden \u201cemotional contracts\u201d to surface.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We are at the forefront of defining how humans and AI interact. Successful business leaders will embrace the emotional contract and set up processes to navigate the ambiguity that will help them win the market.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joy Liu has led enterprise products at AI startups and cloud and AI initiatives at Microsoft.<\/em><\/p>\n Daily insights on business use cases with VB Daily<\/strong><\/p>\n If you want to impress your boss, VB Daily has you covered. We give you the inside scoop on what companies are doing with generative AI, from regulatory shifts to practical deployments, so you can share insights for maximum ROI.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\tThanks for subscribing. Check out more VB newsletters here.\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n An error occured.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>Changing how we evaluate technology<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Getting the \u2018AI baby\u2019 perfect?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What matters most to your business?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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