Why every serious firm should have an AI pledge

A lawyer, someone who studied with me years ago, confessed to me while having dinner that when clients ask if their firm uses AI, that puts them in an awkward position. “If we say we do – he told me – that silently raises the question “why do we then pay the same hourly fees?”. If we say we don’t, we either don’t look credible or not innovative.

At some level we’ve all experienced how faster AI can make our work. In the service business this change can be radical. Most of us accept it and see it as a positive change overall. And all of us want to participate in the benefits AI brings. So, when the work is done by someone else using AI instead of us, this inevitably makes us question how fairly we’re treated.

Our clients know we use AI. Clients of our clients know they use it too. But how much exactly? And for what?

AI can be used for different purposes. Looking at the daily work at Sparkr, I see different areas of application. In our field (marketing), AI can be used to do research, to generate new plans, ideas, designs, artifacts from scratch. It can be used to expand whatever we have created. It can be used to check it and it can be used to repurpose it. It can be used to automate processes. Most crucially, it can complement our thinking or substitute it altogether.

The applications are many and not every company uses AI with the same intensity and for the same purpose. Declaring explicitly how we use AI means we can be transparent into what the benefits are for both us and our clients. Whereas the more AI spreads, the more clients will start to question how AI is being used, if they’re fairly charged and how much of the pie is getting to them.

But why an AI pledge? Why just not “transparency” in general, for example within our terms and services? One argument is about timing and one is about shaping the debate on responsible AI use.

On timing, there’s a big argument in favour of starting the conversation now instead of waiting and the argument is trust. Showing proactiveness means that as a firm we are not afraid of the conversation. We all know AI can bring benefits and we’re being open about it. This level of responsibility means clients see we’re serious and they receive an answer before the question becomes uncomfortable. This way we aim at eliminating uncertainty and doubt.

The other argument is about the awareness that comes with publicity. In fact, a pledge is not only a way to be kept in check. It’s also a way to manifest what we believe in and how to achieve it. For example, a few years into AI usage, one of the fundamental questions for me was how much reasoning and thinking to delegate to AI. Many prefer AI to do the first draft and edit it afterwards. While this is faster, I personally advocate for the opposite approach: do the hard work first and have AI review it. The reason for it is that our ability to think, to reason and create is cultivated exactly in the moment when we make the effort to bring ideas on paper. At Sparkr, that moment is also the highest added value for our clients, who pay us for the quality of our thinking.

Every serious service firm should make it public with an AI pledge how they use AI and for what reason. Doing it proactively and publicly will help preserve trust working with clients and advance a mature, thought-through use of AI.

Note on the AI pledge of Sparkr

The AI pledge of Sparkr is available at sparkr.co/ai-pledge. Everyone can read the principles regulating the way we use AI and get inspiration.