As the popularity of Generative AI continues to rise, organizations are redefining their strategies for implementing chatbots. There is a growing interest in understanding how organizations approach the development of chatbots and whether there is a trend towards consolidating efforts when multiple teams within an organization are independently creating chatbots for specific functions. Organizations need to carefully consider and formulate a comprehensive chatbot strategy that addresses these dynamics. What are the best practices and considerations for creating an overarching chatbot strategy that ensures cohesion and efficiency across the organization? Any guidelines or inputs on how this effort has taken shape and was kicked off will be super helpful.

Some quick thoughts are chatbots and most emerging tech (like generative AI) are particularly susceptible to be shadow IT.  Many business units may be working on chatbots independently and there ends up with no cohesion or consistency.  Depending on the size of org I would suggest a steering committee for chatbots and an agreement to consolidate on a platform.  If the org is larger and this is not possible then there should be org-wide agreements that at a minimum all solutions and bots follow the same or similar approval and review processes to ensure chatbots are behaving as expected.  the most common place I have seen these start is in customer service or technical service departments.  I would personally start SMALL and gain confidence and experience to work up to larger more impactful bots.  Also, an outsourcing approach on this emerging tech should be considered to get started.