Read AI today launched a suite of artificial intelligence (AI) agents for a notetaker platform that promise to not only make meetings more efficient but also potentially reduce the number that individuals need to attend in person.
The Agentic Workflow Suite from Read AI extends the capabilities of the company’s notetaker platform by adding, for example, an AI agent that assesses the attendance, past punctuality and engagement in regularly scheduled meetings to determine whether someone should continue attending in person versus relying on an AI agent to provide a personalized summary of action items, says Read AI CEO David Shim.
In some cases, individuals have been able to reduce the number of meetings they need to personally attend by as much as 20%, he adds.
A survey of 750 professionals conducted by Prodege on behalf of Read AI finds that notetakers and AI are already changing the way individuals work. For example, more than half of workers (54%) report higher productivity at the start of the week since adopting AI tools. A similar percentage (53%) who use AI often or always report having more time to finish tasks in the past 12 months.
Overall, 73% of AI-enabled workers are optimistic that AI will give them more flexibility in their work week.
That data suggests that workers are embracing AI to optimize their time at work, says Shim. In fact, the survey finds more than 70% of respondents want an AI assistant to help them better organize, with 74% specifically wanting help with reminders, scheduling and organizing tasks.
It’s not clear how many individuals are using notetakers for anything more complicated than providing a summary of a meeting, but the opportunity to save time that is often wasted is substantial. Read AI is making a case for a notetaker that can be integrated into all the various messaging platforms, including Microsoft Teams, Zoom and Google Meet. That capability is critical because it enables Read AI to surface insights into related meetings that might have spanned multiple meeting platforms, says Shim. “It’s a system of record for meetings,” he adds.
Additionally, the Read AI platform will also integrate information about meeting attendees pulled from social media sites such as LinkedIn, says Shim. That capability provides attendees with deeper insights into the areas of expertise that each meeting attendee has, he notes.
There is no shortage of opportunities to embrace AI to improve productivity but reducing the amount of time spent in meetings is a use case that is likely to be widely embraced from the bottom up in organizations versus having to be imposed from the top down. Of course, there is no substitute for the personal interactions that create the level of esprit de corps that teams need to drive innovations, but there is also a significant amount of time wasted in poorly organized and managed meetings. The challenge, as always, is striking a balance between reserving time to work on a project versus attending a meeting that might only be ancillary to a mission that requires specific tasks to be completed within a limited amount of time.
