(Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash)

If you fly often enough, you're likely familiar with the SABRE system that handles a lot of the backend for flight bookings.

SABRE's history doubles as a lesson for any company thinking about implementing AI technology. Here's the heavily-abbreviated version:

1/ In the 1950s, American Airlines was using a manual, inefficient, and error-prone process to handle reservations. A single reservation, through a mix of paper and phone calls, required ~90 minutes.

2/ Thanks to a chance encounter with an IBM rep, AA realized that computers could streamline the reservations process. AA partnered with IBM to build that system, dubbed SABRE.

3/ Once the new system was in place, the time to create a reservation shrank to almost-nothing. AA could handle greater reservation volume with fewer errors.

4/ Bonus: by computerizing passenger travel records, AA laid the groundwork for the loyalty program it launched years later. (A loyalty program which, by the by, makes more money than the airline itself...) And eventually that automation would pave the way for self-service booking through its website.

SABRE later split off from AA to become an independent organization. But that's another story.

What does any of this have to do with your company adopting AI?

It's tempting to write it off as "adopt new technology and you're guaranteed to improve your business." That's the popular rallying cry around genAI, but that's not always true. And it's not where I'm going here.

Instead, reviewing the SABRE story, we see that American Airlines:

• started with a business problem (not the technology)

• worked with experts to see how technology could address their business problem (didn't just throw technology at everything in the hopes of finding victory)

• continued to work with experts to plan and implement the system (thereby improving reliability and reducing downside risk exposures)

• found ways to leverage this new asset for other purposes (opening up new avenues of opportunity)

In short: AA didn't chase the technology for technology's sake. They figured out where the tech could actually help them, and they reaped tremendous reward as a result.

(Do you need help figuring out where genAI can help your business? Reach out.)