This CEO is spending $2,400 a month on ChatGPT accounts for all his employees: should you?

Akash Nigam, CEO of Genies, a company that develops avatar technology for apps such as Instagram and iMessage, has bought ChatGPT Plus subscriptions for all his employees. He said during an interview with Business Insider that the company’s productivity has been quickly boosted.

Generative AI, artificial intelligence that can generate content based on simple inputs, has rapidly taken the tech world by storm. The catalyst was the release of ChatGPT, OpenAI’s chatbot, late last year. After just six months, the app is already being used by hundreds of millions of people. Never before has a tech product been adopted so quickly.

Nigam began his experiment in March to increase his company’s productivity and save money.

All 120 employees at Genies then received a ChatGPT Plus account. Each department was encouraged to use the tool as much as possible to automate simple and boring tasks.

Just over a month later, improvements are already noticeable, the CEO told Business Insider. For example, programmers are using the tool to help with coding, marketers are using it to speed up their creative process and lawyers are using the AI to write legal documents.

ChatGPT is even being used to design the strategy to release a new product. That is a process that is normally very labour intensive, Nigam said.

He added that the company will eventually have to hire fewer new people. A few days ago, computer giant IBM also announced that it will hire fewer new employees by using AI for simple tasks.

Not for everyone

Although ChatGPT has already provided a boost, not every employee at Genies is as enthusiastic as their boss. But they may have no choice, with Nigam hinting that staff will have to use AI if they want to make a career at the company.

He noted that a “small fraction” of employees use the technology only in a “passive” way. However, next year, ChatGPT use will even be included in employee performance evaluations at Genies.

Employees who get the most out of the AI tool will be promoted faster within the company. Genies is also hosting informal workshops for employees to learn how to make the most of ChatGPT.

The big question: should other businesses be following suit? And in particular, should you?

This article was originally published on Business AM and can be read in Dutch here.