Integreon Partners With Efficient Elements in Providing Customization Services for Their PowerPoint Add-In

November 12, 2024 – (AUSTIN, LONDON, AND NEUBIBERG) – Integreon, a leading provider of tech-enabled creative, business, and legal services announced a strategic partnership with Efficient Elements (EE), one of the global leaders in add-ins for Microsoft PowerPoint. With their product ‘Efficient Elements for presentations’, the Germany-based software company offers powerful tools to create professional presentations in a blink. The alliance formalizes a decades-long relationship between the two companies serving name brand clients, particularly in the financial services and consulting space. Many Fortune 500 companies struggle to create effective presentation materials quickly and efficiently while staying on brand. Working with Integreon and EE, clients will get 24/7 support from skilled professionals for customizing EE’s PowerPoint add-in to a specific corporate design, saving time and maintaining consistent quality. Other services provided include designing templates, icons, maps, and other custom graphics, as well as customizing agenda slides, and other EE features. Commenting on the partnership, Amit Kothari, Vice President, Creative & Business Solutions, Integreon, said, “For over a decade our partnership with Efficient Elements has been a remarkable journey of innovation and growth honing our expertise in creating thousands of custom EE style packages.” Amit went on to say,” Integreon’s 24/7 global delivery model ensures that our shared clients receive the turnaround time and quality they require. We’re excited to build on this success now and into the future.” Felix Dollinger, Managing Director, Efficient Elements, said, “We are excited to have Integreon as a partner for customizing our PowerPoint add-in ‘Efficient Elements for presentations’. EE offers unique capabilities to flexibly support any number of client styles, which is particularly valuable in consulting business. With Integreon, we are well positioned to deliver custom style packages quickly and at scale.” About Integreon Integreon is the trusted, global provider of creative, business, and legal outsourced solutions to corporations and law firms seeking to expand their capabilities and transform their performance. The company’s 3,500+ professionals provide expert support across a range of managed services—from creative design, content delivery and administrative support to legal and compliance. With global delivery centers on three continents, Integreon delivers round-the-clock service in 50+ languages and is deeply committed to client success, consistently delivering innovative, tech-enabled solutions that improve agility and efficiency to drive business performance. Integreon is owned by EagleTree Capital, a leading New York-based middle-market private equity firm with over $5 billion of assets under management. For more information about Integreon’s range of services, email [email protected] and follow Integreon at LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. About Efficient Elements Being one of the leading providers of add-ins for Microsoft PowerPoint globally, thousands of customers in more than 100 countries trust in Efficient Elements, including some of the largest and most renowned management consultancies and global corporations. With its unique feature set and customizability to any corporate design, ‘Efficient Elements for presentations’ dramatically increases slide quality and brand compliance while saving approx. 30% of the time spent with PowerPoint, guaranteeing a quick return on investment. For more information, visit efficient-elements.com or contact [email protected].

Navigating PERM Recruitment Successfully

This article first appeared on HR.com. View the original article here.  The process of applying for green card sponsorships for foreign workers has become increasingly complex for employers in recent years. This is due in part to even more rigorous enforcement of labor certification regulations and employment anti-discrimination provisions by the Department of Labor (DOL) and the Department of Justice (DOJ).  Recent high-profile lawsuits involving large tech companies and their hiring practices illustrate the importance of transparency and “good faith” efforts in the recruitment process.  For employers, this means that their approach to handling Program Electronic Review Management (PERM) recruitment process requires increased diligence in regulatory compliance, thorough documentation, and proactive planning.  How do employers balance this changing landscape and still complete PERM recruitment successfully? Consider the following best practices:  Adhere to a Recruitment Timetable Successfully navigating the PERM process hinges on precise timing, especially during the recruitment phase, as DOL regulations are stringent and allow little flexibility with deadlines. Employers seeking labor certification must confirm that they have conducted a bona fide test through various recruitment methods before filing the PERM application. Once the Prevailing Wage Determination (PWD) is filed and pending with the DOL, it is crucial to have a detailed plan for conducting recruitment. This plan should include whether pay transparency laws apply specifying the types of advertisements to be posted, their timing, and the methods for record-keeping.  Keep in mind that recruitment must start before the PWD expiration date with all recruitment activities occurring at least 30 days, but no more than 180 days, before the PERM filing date. A well-organized recruitment campaign demands careful planning that involves multiple steps, including advertising across various media and posting job orders, which take at least 30 days to complete. By proactively developing a plan, employers can prevent rushing at the last minute which can lead to errors or missed deadlines, potentially jeopardizing the entire recruitment process. Planning and staying mindful of expiration dates and regulatory timeframes are crucial to ensuring a smooth and successful recruitment phase. Mirror Regular Recruitment Practices and Uphold “Good Faith” Efforts  DOL regulations require employers to demonstrate “good faith” throughout the PERM process. This issue was a focal point in the DOJ’s recent lawsuits against tech companies. The “good faith” standard” states that, to the extent possible, employers must conduct recruitment for the PERM position as they would for any other domestic hire.  Employers should give particular attention to the application methods for the PERM role. As highlighted in recent DOJ litigations, these methods should mirror the employer’s typical recruitment practices and not require applicants to use alternative or outdated methods that might deter or narrow the pool of qualified candidates. By aligning PERM recruitment standard company practices, employers demonstrate consistency and mitigate the risk of appearing to favor foreign applicants. Use Caution When Reviewing Applicants A typical error in PERM recruitment is the delay in reaching out to potentially qualified U.S. applicants, so employers must be vigilant about timelines for reviewing and contacting them. While the regulations do not specify exact timelines, the DOL requires employers to demonstrate “good faith” in reaching out to applicants, which is also highlighted in recent DOJ litigation. “Good faith” efforts entail promptly contacting applicants who may be minimally qualified for the PERM role to avoid deterring their interest or delaying with the intent that they become unavailable. Delays in contacting potentially qualified applicants can be interpreted as a lack of genuine interest in hiring domestically, which may lead to legal action from the DOL and/or DOJ. Given that regulations do not specify a minimum number of contact attempts, employers should exercise discretion in their outreach efforts. The frequency and timing of these attempts should align with the employer’s standard recruitment practices and demonstrate a “good faith” effort to reach the applicant. It is crucial to thoroughly document all contact attempts, instances of a lack of response, and any confirmations from applicants indicating disinterest in the PERM role. Do Not Delay in Reaching Out to Potentially Qualified Applicants A typical error in PERM recruitment is the delay in reaching out to potentially qualified U.S. applicants, so employers must be vigilant about timelines for reviewing and contacting them. While the regulations do not specify exact timelines, the DOL requires employers to demonstrate “good faith” in reaching out to applicants, which is also highlighted in recent DOJ litigation. “Good faith” efforts entail promptly contacting applicants who may be minimally qualified for the PERM role to avoid deterring their interest or delaying with the intent that they become unavailable. Delays in contacting potentially qualified applicants can be interpreted as a lack of genuine interest in hiring domestically, which may lead to legal action from the DOL and/or DOJ. Given that regulations do not specify a minimum number of contact attempts, employers should exercise discretion in their outreach efforts. The frequency and timing of these attempts should align with the employer’s standard recruitment practices and demonstrate a “good faith” effort to reach the applicant. It is crucial to thoroughly document all contact attempts, instances of a lack of response, and any confirmations from applicants indicating disinterest in the PERM role. Be Aware of Technology’s Role (and Potential Risks) in Recruitment  In today’s digital age, technology is increasingly crucial, and the PERM process is no exception. Tools like applicant tracking systems and AI-powered solutions can help employers organize resumes and screen applicants, enhancing efficiency and accuracy. However, ambiguity remains about how technology can and should be used during PERM recruitment while staying compliant with DOL guidelines, as regulations do not address the use of advanced technology in applicant vetting.  Before integrating tracking systems and AI-powered technology into PERM processes, employers should be aware of several potential concerns. One major issue is the risk of bias and discrimination, as AI systems can inadvertently perpetuate or amplify existing biases in the data they are trained on, leading to unfair treatment of certain applicant groups. Additionally, the complexity and opacity of AI algorithms can make it difficult

7 Best Practices to Address the Human Factor of Cyber Attack Defense

Our previous Cybersecurity Awareness Month article, discussed the need to be aware of the human factors behind cyberattacks against organizations. Here are the seven best practices to address these human factors: 1. Be aware of where your data is and how long you really need the data Prolonging data storage beyond its necessary timeframe can heighten the risk of security breaches, subject you to additional legal complexities, and incur avoidable expenses. For instance, we once had a client who encountered significantly elevated compliance costs due to their failure to implement standard data retention policies. 2. Ensure you use multi-factor authentication (MFA) As it is a simple and essential security measure. Without MFA, you become an easier target for hackers. In today’s landscape, hackers operate like businesses and prefer to target individuals who require minimal effort for maximum gain. Don’t let yourself become their high-profit customer or victim. 3. Avoid using your work email for personal online activities such as emailing or shopping. Doing so raises the likelihood of your work being targeted by hackers. Cybercriminals frequently focus on business accounts by exploiting emails obtained from less secure personal accounts. 4. Be careful with payment requests such as emailing or shopping. Doing so raises the likelihood of your work being targeted by hackers. Cybercriminals frequently focus on business accounts by exploiting emails obtained from less secure personal accounts. 5. Verify through an alternative channel When you receive a suspicious email, verifying the information through a different communication channel is essential. Instead of replying to the email with questions like “Are you sure,” it’s best to call and speak with the sender directly to confirm the message’s authenticity. 6. Be honest and direct when reporting a potential breach This gives your cybersecurity team time to stop the breach. Report the incident truthfully and entirely to your cybersecurity team, or IT help desk. Most organizations have sophisticated tools to compare user accounts with system logs. If the story is not truthful, it will likely be discovered eventually. Do not try to handle a cyber incident by pretending it is a simple password reset issue. Most organizations understand and honor users when they make an honest mistake or fall victim to cyber hackers. 7. Cyber security is a team effort Cyber defense relies on layers of protection across technology and business processes. By working together and being supportive, we can create a culture of accountability and success. We can solve complex issues like cyber defense when we unite as a team. Happy Cybersecurity Awareness Month! Read our other Cybersecurity Awareness Month Blogs

Case Study: Legal Document Processing

LDP case study explaining benefits

Elevating Performance and Reducing Cost of an AmLaw 50 Firm’s Document Team Client Top 50 US law firm known for representing some of the world’s largest technology and life sciences companies. Practice areas include corporate, litigation, patents and innovations, regulatory, and technology transactions. Challenge Documents lie at the heart of legal matters, and for any law firm operating under the pressures of increased workloads and client demands to reduce costs, creating efficiencies for document production is essential. Our client sought an approach to reduce document production time, while decreasing costs. The selected solution also had to ensure not just speed, but accuracy while also meeting regulatory requirements and client agreements on time and budget. The firm turned to Integreon legal document processing services team to architect and implement a new firm-wide model to boost the performance of their document product team. Solution Integreon worked closely with the law firm’s operations and administrative leaders to pinpoint the obstacles to making document production efficient and created a series of recommendations and a roadmap to meet their objectives: Reconfigured Team to Boost Performance Created a high performing, well-coordinated, dual-shore support team, with upgraded skills and knowledge including enhanced presentation support Custom designed and deployed in-depth work quality training Streamlined the firm’s document production hiring process to ensure resources are placed on the team to best meet client expectations Improved Efficiencies Created and rolled out a robust workflow model to improve team efficiency and manage workflow Developed a cost-effective workload capacity plan and implemented automation to improve efficiencies Built “quick turn team” to handle rush projects with required delivery time of two hours or less. Now 50% of the overall team’s work is handled this way Improved use and accuracy of project and production hours reporting Upgraded Work Product and Service Levels Devised quality assurance framework to maintain high service standards Developed commitment to continuous improvement through feedback loops and proactive adjustments Applied strict adherence to legal and regulatory requirements across multiple jurisdictions Strengthened Data Security Practices Identified and implemented a safer, more secure and client connectivity system supported 24/7, creating less downtime and access complications (Integreon Citrix) Adopted best practices security configurations, and created unique, auditable user accounts with specific access security such as dual-factor authentication Results Dual-shore model resulted in 15% overall cost reduction Scaled headcount in response to increased workload and adoption of new services Team assisted in expediting implementation of new document management system Both US and offshore (Mumbai-based) associates can access Citrix through different servers and can connect to alternate servers in case of any downtime that arises due to maintenance or any IT related activity

Even GenAI Needs a mother and other Takeaways from My Week on the Road

The last few weeks have been busy, full of face-to-face meetings that have left me energized and inspired. While our new remote world offers countless benefits, more flexibility, and increased collaboration across time zones, you just can’t beat interacting with people in person. I had the pleasure of attending Relativity Fest in Chicago followed immediately by the Nuix XLR8 conference in London. Both events were fantastic opportunities to reconnect with colleagues, exchange ideas, and explore the future of our industry. Unsurprisingly, genAI took centre stage at both conferences. It’s an exciting time to be in eDiscovery, and I feel fortunate to be able see the landscape evolve in real time. As we know, genAI is showing enormous promise in enhancing efficiencies across a range of workflows. That said, as we embrace the evolution of AI technology, we must be mindful of the ethical and moral implications. As humans we must take our responsibility seriously to fully benefit from the true potential of the AI/human partnership. We must respect the power of AI, treat it with care and nurture it as it evolves. Arbitrary guardrails to keep AI on the right path are not enough. One of my favourite quotes from the Nuix XLR8 conference came from the keynote speaker, Liesl Yearsley, “I don’t think GenAI needs a master, I think it needs a mother.” This perfectly captures the need for responsible, thoughtful implementation of AI systems. It’s a powerful tool, but it requires careful oversight and guidance to ensure it is used ethically. The Future of Human Review Throughout both conferences, one topic consistently came up in my conversations: the future of human review. Many posed questions to me such as: “Do you think human review is on its way out?” “Aren’t you worried about GenAI?” “Isn’t GenAI causing concern at your company?” Of course, these are valid questions, and while GenAI is certainly reshaping aspects of the world in which we work, I don’t believe we’re heading toward the extinction of human reviewers. In fact, I see the role of humans evolving rather than diminishing. Ten years ago, first-level review looked vastly different than it does today, and technology has always played a part in that evolution. As genAI becomes more integrated into eDiscovery, we’ll see smaller, more specialized teams handling tasks that were once more labor intensive. That’s not bad news, it’s growth. There are three critical components of a successful document review – training, calibration and validation. Humans remain at the core of all three of these components and they are baked into all defensible genAI review workflows. Even in a hypothetical world where genAI is 100% adopted, 100% accurate and is free to use, humans are still needed to design, manage, and oversee the workflow. One Tool in a Toolkit It’s important to remember that genAI is just one tool in a broader eDiscovery toolkit. While it will undoubtedly bring efficiencies, it won’t solve every problem. Additionally, as data types and volumes continue to grow, the challenges eDiscovery practitioners face will evolve as well. GenAI might reduce some headaches, but it could also introduce new ones. For instance, prompts being discoverable, will only add fuel to the fire of expanding data types and volumes, bringing with it added complexities across the EDRM. GenAI being one tool in a broader toolbox is even more important to remember when you look at the wider context of the market and risk tolerance for genAI. Of course, there are some who are fully emersed in all things AI, while at the other end of the spectrum you have some who are very resistant to risk, change and/or technology. Then you have everyone else in the middle, some may have an interest in learning about the power of genAI, but they are happy with long established workflows underpinned by tried and trusted review efficiency techniques. One size does not fit all in the world of litigation, disputes and investigations. It never will. The Exciting Road Ahead I expect that we’ll soon start to see litigation about AI in discovery in both the US and the UK that will shape how we move forward as an industry. 2025 is going to be an incredibly interesting year as the courts as legislators tackle genAI, helping us better predict the future eDiscovery landscape. There’s no question that genAI is here to stay, and it will continue to evolve and improve, while at the same time the cost of use will come down. As we navigate this exciting period of transformation, I’m optimistic about what’s ahead. GenAI is a powerful tool, but the human element remains irreplaceable in ensuring its success. Together, we can harness this technology to create more efficient, effective, and innovative workflows that push our industry forward. GenAI is here to enhance our efficiency and elevate our capabilities, not make us extinct.

Strong Cyber Security is Just Good Business

With digitization and the proliferation of cyberattacks, having a well-conceived cyber security strategy is imperative for businesses globally. Threat actors are gaining in sophistication making use of new technologies such as generative AI to develop targeted phishing and malware attacks rendering organizations even more susceptible. While having sensitive data exfiltrated is the result of most cyber breaches, it is only one area of impact. Companies need to ensure they are developing a comprehensive cyber security approach to guard against additional types of exposure. The benefits of having strong cybersecurity practices in place include: Protection of Sensitive Information: Cybersecurity measures help safeguard confidential business data, including customer information, financial records, and intellectual property, from unauthorized access and breaches. Maintaining Customer Trust: Robust cybersecurity practices help build and maintain trust with customers, who expect their personal and financial information to be secure and protected from cyber threats. Preventing Financial Loss: Cybersecurity can help avoid the financial impact of data breaches, including legal fees, regulatory fines, and loss of business. Compliance with Regulations: Many industries are subject to strict data protection regulations. Strong cybersecurity practices ensure businesses stay compliant and avoid penalties. Safeguarding Business Reputation: A data breach can severely damage a company’s reputation. Investing in cybersecurity helps protect the business’s image and public perception. Ensuring Business Continuity: Cyberattacks can disrupt business operations. Robust cybersecurity ensures businesses can continue operating smoothly, even under potential threats. Mitigating Risk of Cyber Threats: Proactive cybersecurity measures identify and mitigate risks before they can be exploited by cybercriminals, reducing overall risk exposure. Competitive Advantage: A strong cybersecurity posture can be a market differentiator, showing customers and partners that the business prioritizes data security. Protecting Against Ransomware: Cybersecurity helps defend against ransomware attacks that lock business data and demand payment, ensuring that data remains secure and accessible. Supporting Innovation: Cybersecurity enables businesses to innovate and adopt new technologies confidently, knowing they are protected against potential threats. Happy Cybersecurity Awareness Month! Read our other Cybersecurity Awareness Month Blogs

Cyber Awareness – Be Aware of the Human Factor

October marks Cyber Awareness Month, a time to focus on the complex and increasingly sophisticated cyber threat landscape. At Integreon, I lead the CISO, CIO, and Product Engineering organization. Cybersecurity is of paramount importance and at the core of everything we do. Using a sports car as an analogy, cybersecurity is like the brake in the car, which sets the limits on how big an engine we can put into a sports car. Sound cybersecurity practices are therefore a vital innovation accelerator. Because we are passionate about AI/GenAI, we have come to be passionate about cybersecurity, knowing it is the foundation for operational excellence and customer trust. According to Check Point Research, cyber attacks globally increased 30% YOY in Q2 2024, reaching 1,636 attacks per organization per week. Threat actors using AI to write code for malware and security vulnerabilities created by remote work are two factors attributing to increased cyber incidences. How can you best defend your organization against this growing threat?   Today, defending against cyber threats requires a highly collaborative approach, involving not just a select few cybersecurity professionals, but everyone across the organization. It all starts with raising awareness and extends to implementing and enforcing best practices. Ultimately, companies must rely on humans acting responsibly and maintaining vigilance. Strategies for protecting against or mitigating a cyberattack include both human and system factors.  Human factors include: 1. Digital Hygiene: Good digital hygiene involves several important habits. First, it’s crucial to avoid reusing passwords across multiple accounts to minimize the risk of unauthorized access. Additionally, sharing devices with others can expose sensitive information, so it’s advisable to limit device access to only trusted individuals. Finally, using only secure Wi-Fi networks can help prevent potential security breaches and unauthorized access to personal and other data. 2. Human Behavioral Hacking: Tactics can include phishing emails which pose a significant threat and can be extremely sophisticated in nature. A large portion of the emails that reach corporate inboxes are either phishing attempts or spam. Despite the presence of advanced anti-phishing and anti-spam tools, malicious emails still slip through the cracks. In the aftermath of a company experiencing a cyber incident, hackers have even been known to call employees posing as IT helpdesk personnel to gain control over the end user’s PC. Threat actors are upping their game using advanced tools. Phishing emails are harder to detect as they now infrequently contain red flag spelling and grammar mistakes. Instead, they are sophisticated in appearance and well-written, often personalized and generated with the help of AI/GenAI tools. System factors include: 1. Application Failures: Database corruption can lead to the loss of critical data, system downtime, and potential financial implications for businesses. Therefore, it is crucial to regularly backup data, implement robust security measures, and conduct routine maintenance to mitigate the risks associated with such failures. 2. Industry Incidents: Like the CrowdStrike service disruption early this year and the telecom carrier DNS outage, these events resulted in significant downtime and exposure for businesses worldwide. 3. Hardware/Infrastructure Failure: The most challenging scenario for an infrastructure failure is when an organization’s system is partially down yet remaining with a system “heartbeat”. This makes diagnosis and recovery decisions more difficult. Generally, the more automated and lower cost the recovery option is, the faster and easier it is for the operations team to take decisive action to maintain business continuity. Actions to protect against and respond to the threat landscape include: 1. Reducing the Attack Surface. This is the security boundary once breached can lead to data loss. Identity and network access points are common security boundaries. When you have more account or account authorization active than minimally necessary, you enlarge the attack surface. This is why the account of an offboarded employee should be expeditiously removed. By the same token, when you create network topology, you want to control the access points, especially those that are externally facing so that there are fewer entry points for an attacker to gain access into your network. Controlling network access can be done physically or through software or a combination of both. In summary, you want to make the security boundary as small and as controlled as practical to minimize the attack surface available to hackers. 2. Mitigating vulnerabilities before hackers can exploit them. 3. Minimizing the impact when a cyber incident occurs, otherwise known as minimizing the “blast radius”. For example, when a server is comprised, it does not necessitate bringing the other servers down. By using techniques such as zoning and subnetting you can limit the impact that a single comprise can have on your overall technology landscape. 4. Creating resilient recovery options often requires having additional recovery instances. Prepare ahead by identifying risks, backing up data, and establishing response protocols. System resiliency tools and strategies have greatly improved over the years. However, the human factor continues to be the area of greatest vulnerability. As systems become more secure, AI/GenAI has made humans an even softer target for threat actors. Addressing it requires a collective effort and daily vigilance. Happy Cyber Awareness Month! Read our other Cyber Awareness Month Blogs

“Garbage In – Garbage Out!” Still Applies with Gen AI

This article originally appeared on Solutions Review’s Insight Jam, an enterprise IT community enabling the human conversation on AI. View the original article here. For as long as there have been computers, we’ve heard the warning, “Garbage in – Garbage out!” when it came to expecting great outcomes from using poor data. But with the advent of generative AI (GAI) applications, many were hopeful we had finally unshackled ourselves from the issues of poor-quality data undermining the benefits of technology deployments. Surely, this amazing new technology that could learn to find answers from a single example, that could spot and summarize key issues in massive documents in seconds, could also weed through the mess that describes much, if not most, of our data storage. Like Mickey Mouse as the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, we would wave our GAI wand over our cauldron of data and out would come the insights and value long hidden in that dark brew of duplicated, mismatched, incomplete, and poorly OCR’d files. True magic! But is it? A recent study by Gartner suggests that at least 30 percent of GAI projects will be abandoned after proof of concept by the end of 2025 due to poor data quality, inadequate risk controls, escalating costs or unclear business value. Oh my, that doesn’t sound like magic in the making. So why is GAI still stymied by poor data quality, and what should we be doing about it? “Garbage in – Garbage out!” manifests in three primary ways for Gen AI. We see it first in the form of bias and hallucination in our response output when we allow the GAI to wander untamed data sources to provide us with answers. Uncontrolled access yields unpredictable and likely undesirable outcomes. We see it again prominently in the quality of answers we get when the questions or prompts we ask lack the direction or sophistication to get us true value. Your answers are only as good as the questions you ask. Finally, we see it in the form of incomplete or inaccurate responses if we point GAI toward our in-house data sources when they remain full of duplicates, poor-quality images, and incomplete and improperly associated files. Anyone planning to undertake a GAI project needs to address all three of these data quality pitfalls if they expect to achieve basic objectives, much less the often-lofty expectations that flow from this new technology. The first pitfall, bias from untamed resource access, can be controlled by understanding the application you are using and how it is querying the LLM behind your actions. Responsible vendors are containing their search parameters to get responsible outputs. Beware of just using an unfettered Chat GTP interface. The second pitfall is avoiding garbage through poor prompting, which requires education. Investing in your team’s skills will be required of anyone operating in this new GAI environment. Basic courses are available to help users avoid mistakes and get better outcomes from their prompt attempts. For important projects, you can employ a partner organization that has already upskilled their team on prompt engineering. Key partners and service providers have upskilled services teams with training and practice at creating effective prompts. A partner can work within your environment to help you optimize your GAI capabilities without burdening your teams. Finally, there is the age-old need for data cleansing. While GAI may learn to find a particular topic faster than traditional machine learning AI, it will still struggle with poorly imaged documents, distinguishing duplicates, and associating disparate files to get complete and accurate answers. Most organizations have less than stellar data hygiene. A partner can help you clean up that data in cost-manageable chunks, prioritizing high-value or, most often, queried content. Over time, a minimal but steady investment in data clean-up and storage hygiene will pay dividends in getting you more effective output from your upcoming GAI initiatives. We all want the magic, but as any magician will tell you, there is a trick to success behind the show-stopping finish. Investing in your skills, your questions, and your data quality are the required elements of GAI magic. Partners are available to help with these elements. Don’t wait to get your success pieces in place. Foundational investments now will yield dividends when key GAI initiatives take off. And remember, “Garbage in – Garbage out!” still rules.