CASE STUDY
In the long-term, we see moving into
increasing our AI systems to enable all our
clients access services through touchscreens
where one simply uses their ID and all
relevant social information, and it will
automatically register the user in our social
intervention programmes. future, and we create scenarios of how we
will address these challenges when they
happen. We call it the ‘what if’ analysis.
Do you think AI can only grow in
importance in the future? It is certainly important. We mainly cater
to UAE nationals based in Dubai, as well
as the larger community in the emirate,
which is made up of various nationalities.
It is essential for us to understand what is
happening around various communities.
Yes, I am confident AI will only increase in
value in the coming years. In the region,
information exchange is done differently
where it used to be operating through book
registration. Now, we are talking about a
360-degree approach.
Introducing change in a community
really requires a lot of focus into so many
different levels. There is a need to focus
at the individual level, the family level,
and the community to be able to sustain
change. However, at present it is not easy
to simultaneously monitor their concerns,
which makes it necessary to automate
monitoring programmes.
Change is not easy to implement and
sustain if we miss one single element. If an
individual receives the message, we must
It sounds as if analytics is really
important to the way your
organisation operates?
In terms of analysis, we need to know what
is going on in the news, in the economy and
who is doing what in order to have a better
social analysis.
We cannot analyse the data based on a
single source, which makes it necessary
to apply the 360-degree view and then
based on that, move towards automation.
However, this will take some time to build up
queries and KPIs.
With social change, there are multiple
variations with the queries, which means
we need to build up and constantly
monitor these variations to have
PEOPLE ARE BEGINNING TO REALISE
AS WELL THAT THERE IS A NEED TO
DEVELOP SOCIAL APPLICATIONS THAT
IMPROVE OUR SOCIAL COHESION.
ensure that the family can host it and also
that the community believes in it.
In the information age, AI will enable us into
developing this understanding into futuristic
programmes, giving us forecasts or insights
to enable us to decide on our next steps or
what we need to do.
We are also introducing the Social Risk
Register where we predict challenges in the
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INTELLIGENTCIO
something sturdy. The community must
be involved and the people in building
up these KPIs, to be truly able to deliver
effective services to the community.
What is the attitude of the
community to technology?
There are still varying degrees of responses
when it comes to technology use. For the
people who are skilled to use these kind of
systems, we are keeping the service available
online. However, for those who do not know
how to use the system, we provide an offline
mode and it is being administered through a
case manager.
Nowadays, it is easier than five or 10
years ago because most people now own
a smartphone or have access to a normal
desktop or laptop to access the Internet.
When it comes to supporting the elderly,
what we have is a system where a couple of
clicks will enable them to request something.
We don’t want them to go through putting
in too many details because senior citizens
are normally not keen to stay online.
It is important for us to cater to all these
kinds of customers – and think the way they
think to provide solutions based on their
mindset and accustomed practices.
Is the other side of the coin that the
younger generation expect all the
services to be online?
The young generation nowadays have
become more dependent on technology that
they want everything delivered to their home
or location and that is both good and bad.
It is good to have access to a smartphone as
one can deliver anything.
However, people are beginning to realise
as well that there is a need to develop
social applications that improve our social
cohesion and inclusion. This is an important
factor in terms of developing technology
applications for the social sector. In previous
years, people were unconvinced that the
public would use them but bearing in mind
the attitude of the younger generation, I
believe this is what will happen within the
next two to three years.
I can see services moving towards
empowering the National ID, just like the
social security number in the United States
and Europe, which means there will be an
increase in data acquisition and sharing.
The younger ones are not afraid of sharing
this information, but the older generation
are still hesitant to these trends. In this
regard, we will have more applications
in the social sector which will cater to
younger generations. n
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