Pairing Deloitte’s human insights with AI technology
Creating and scaling trustworthy GenAI across Deloitte
PairD: GenAI for Deloitte, by Deloitte
PairD, Deloitte’s virtual AI helper, first launched at Deloitte UK in October 2023 and is now available to tens of thousands of people in NSE. It provides colleagues with access to AI technology in a safe and secure Deloitte environment.
Pronounced as “paired”, PairD serves to support, not replace, human insights and talents and helps NSE colleagues with a range of day-to-day tasks, including summarising content, writing code or carrying out research, for example.
Its introduction came in response to the growing demand the firm was seeing for AI-based technologies. With a wide range of tools available in the market, it was important to get ahead of the risks and find a solution rather than restrict its use.
Tom Wyett, Deloitte NSE’s platforms, data and environments leader, said: “GenAI has attracted huge amounts of attention, both internally and with our clients. It was clear we needed to find a solution for the firm, one that could put GenAI technology into the hands of our people. It had to be innovative and creative by nature, but robust so it wouldn’t risk the integrity and security of our firm’s and clients’ data.
“There was a lot of enthusiasm within the firm to find a GenAI solution, one that we could scale quickly, but it had to be done in a safe and controlled environment.”
The answer to the challenge? A home-grown GenAI platform – for Deloitte, by Deloitte.
From idea to reality: bringing PairD to life
PairD was created by the Deloitte AI Institute in the UK, led by Sulabh Soral. The vision was to deliver a Deloitte GenAI solution to our people across NSE. However, getting to this milestone was no easy feat, given regulatory, privacy, legal and security matters combined with the sheer pace of GenAI’s growth.
“It’s really difficult to achieve commercial value from scaling GenAI within large and complex organisations like ours,” commented Soral. “The challenges are vast – ranging from ensuring data privacy and security, managing upfront and ongoing financial costs, delivering technical integrations into existing complex IT systems and the legal and ethical implications for employees and our client work. And this list is by no means exhaustive – it was a huge undertaking to take something from general release and make it relevant for our firm.”
Overcoming these considerations was possible thanks to the integrated efforts of specialists from across NSE.
Soral said: “Rapidly taking PairD live to our people represented a significant step-forward for us – the solution not only had to meet our own standards, but industry-wide too. So, we applied a Deloitte approach, one that combined our multi-disciplinary expertise with the same rigour and due diligence you’d expect from our firm.
“It was brilliant to see so many teams from across the firm – those with expertise in AI technology, platforms, risk, legal, ethics, and data security and privacy – rally behind this common goal. With a lot of grit and determination, we were able to develop a solution that met our exacting standards for ethical and secure GenAI use within the firm.”
Over 14 Deloitte teams came together to develop PairD
Provided to 800 employees at Scope, a UK disability equality charity
Looking beyond Deloitte to close the digital divide
PairD forms an integral part of Deloitte’s wider efforts to transform the firm through technology – not just in its offices, but within society. Following its introduction, PairD has since been rolled out to Scope UK, the disability equality charity.
Looking at AI more generally - in Norway our AI ethical schools programme, which has so far been delivered to several events for children and youth, 16 schools, and reached close to 1,600 students.
Richard Houston, senior partner and CEO, Deloitte NSE, commented: “GenAI should be available and accessible to everyone. That’s why we provided free access and training for the tool to Scope UK, the disability equality charity. The GenAI team has worked with Scope to upskill its employees to make full use of GenAI in a way that supports Scope and the people they’re trying to help every day.
“The plan is to take the learnings from this and then help other charities in a similar way. It forms part of our long-term ambitions to help make access to AI more inclusive and close the digital divide.”
Prompt like a Pro
Using GenAI is straightforward when you know how to prompt like a pro! Here are our top three tips for getting the most out of GenAI platforms:
Be clear and concise, using natural language.
Provide context around how the content generated will be used.
Be specific and use relevant keywords in your instructions.
