We reproduce the article that you can find in the newspaper “Words of Management,” one of the newspapers that was invited to the preview presentation of the COSMO release, which will take place on October 31 at the HR Innovation Forum in Bologna.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is no longer scary. This is demonstrated (also) by data from a research sponsored by Futureberry that investigated how the new technology will transform skills, but also what are the expectations and organizational models of the world of work, training and university. And it was from this data that the consulting firm, which supports companies in the paths of transformation, innovation and organizational change, came up with Cosmo, an innovative training tool based on Generative AI: “It is a pioneering digital academy powered by a proprietary AI Gen model; it creates personalized learning paths and on-demand promotes empowerment and self-development,” Dino Torrisi, CEO of Futureberry called it at the presentation of the solution to the press, which Words of Management was able to preview with two other news outlets.
But let’s go in order, because the launch of the training platform followed the results of the study on AI conducted and structured by Maria Vidi, a researcher, psychologist and lecturer at several colleges, who surveyed college students and workers in their 20s and 30s (the panel was evenly divided between North, South, Central and gender), potential users of Cosmo. Contrary to popular belief, AI was familiar to 82 percent of the sample, and for most of the young people surveyed, the technology refers to “positive traits” (57 percent), such as “innovation,” “future,” and “progress”; the figure related to “negative traits” (12 percent) and “risk” (2 percent) was clearly limited. By contrast, 16% referred back to “tools,” where ChatGtp takes the lead as the distinctly better-known solution (just for comparison: the OpenAI tool is at 14% versus Alexa, the second best-known, stationary at 0.3%).
For the 20-30 age group, moreover, AI is linked to terms such as “potential,” “development,” “change,” and “opportunity.” With respect to the activities to be performed, the sample claims that “it is useful in some innovative fields” (54 percent), “improves the efficiency of some work processes” (45 percent), “allows new ways of learning” (42 percent) and “facilitates study and training” (40 percent). Conversely, the weaknesses of technology were also highlighted: “It gives rise to new privacy risks” (27 percent), “It replaces human labor” (23 percent), “It makes people lose jobs” (21 percent), and “It creates dependence and makes people lose human skills” (21 percent).
AI is the ally for training as well
Futureberry’s research also investigated the enjoyment of AI: it found that 79 percent of respondents had direct experience with the technology, and the level of satisfaction was very high (7.5 on a scale of 10, with 45 percent giving a rating between 8 and 10). The areas of application were “work” and “study,” but also “fun” and “curiosity,” confirming that we are still in an experimental stage of AI. Particularly interesting is the data on the use of technology: while it is clear that students make extensive use of it (74 percent), it is surprising that it also applies to workers (36 percent).
In the face of all these data and premises, the impact of AI is also scaled down from what traditional narratives are leading us to believe. Just 16 percent of respondents believe that AI has a negative impact on education, and only 28 percent speak negatively about it in regard to the labor market (somewhat higher percentages than “ethics and privacy,” as this is clearly still an open question).
It is not surprising then that 73 percent of young people feel ready to face the challenges and opportunities posed by AI in the world of work, although it is clear that there is a renewed focus with respect to the skills to be developed. At the top of the ranking that emerged from the study, these are the skills considered most important: “technology literacy,” “quality control,” and “curiosity and continuous learning” (“analytical thinking,” “creative thinking,” and “motivation and self-awareness” also find their way into the ranking). “People show great confidence with AI, but their experience is mostly limited to using ChatGpt,” Torrisi commented when presenting the research results. “The experience of AI is generally very positive and more areas of opportunity than risk are captured; among the areas of expertise, digital literacy and the ability to decode information provided by AI emerge as key to digital transformation.”
A new digital learning platform
All the data from the study led to reasoning about the paradigm shift in the area of training through digital platforms (for the trainer and the user). As explained by Michele Bianchi, Head of AI and Tech at Futureberry and Chief Operating Officer of Cosmo, with respect to who uses the content, it emerges that the new orientation is going in the direction of “instant expectations” with training moving from push mode to pull mode (the user looking for content at the moment they need it). In addition, the ‘new’ training is oriented to the specific needs of the individual and no longer to those of so-called ‘homogeneous groups’ of people. With regard to the training provider, however, the change is about the need to constantly update content, with a view to ‘surfing the moment’; furthermore, the trainer must move from asking questions to understanding what people feel and then providing an appropriate response to real needs.
So from these premises Cosmo was born (“The name was born in our meeting room ‘Space,’ and since we want to look to the future, we liked the idea of going to the exploration of the galaxy,” Torrisi admitted). The idea dates back to the spring of 2023, but there have been numerous stages that have allowed the solution to reach the market (October 2024): study of design principles (June 2023), prototyping (September 2023), testing (December 2023-February 2024), fine tuning (April 2024), customer experience study (June 2024), development (July 2024), and product fit research (September 2024).
Underlying the tool’s operation is the desire of its creators to prevent “hallucinations” with respect to training content. How many times, in fact, have we been told that the Internet is a great training resource? But who assures us that the content is really good? For this reason, Futureberry has built Cosmo’s knowledge base using its own content alongside that provided by the company purchasing the tool and by third-party content, certified, however, by the consulting firm: these are concept maps, texts, videos and audios. Against user profiling-through interactions, interests and role, as well as content fruition data-the system, through a proprietary AI system, generates custom content that reflects personal learning style and proposes real-time interaction with a Generative AI tutor, with whom one converses in natural language.
This is the real special feature of the tool, which differs from other digital learning solutions: through interactions with the tutor, the system-using a model developed by Futureberry-is able to analyze the user’s degree of understanding with respect to a particular topic and thus his or her level of learning. It is from the different modes of dialogue with the AI Gen (the user can only search for answers; he can ask to share scenarios; he can confront the system as if he were a colleague…) that the insights useful for monitoring people’s professional development, intercepting their training needs, and identifying the company’s training gap are obtained. This information is also particularly useful for HR management, which, in this way, monitors the actual results of training.
While waiting for its official introduction to the market, the developers of the training platform already have more innovations in store. For example, integration with live training is planned to offer a phigytal experience (expected to be introduced from 2025). Meanwhile, there are numerous application cases imagined for Cosmo: training for hard and soft skills development; facilitation of onboarding processes; internal communication; and one-to-one mentoring. But this is only the beginning.
Write by Dario Colombo