There was a lot of hype. But those hawking that hype have been dying out in waves from the beginning, and the technology is catching up to the promises.
We recently profiled several good articles that downplayed the effectiveness of AI without first investing in good data hygiene, e.g., the cleanup of CRM data, making process improvements before automating them, and so on.
These are true to an extent, but we have to acknowledge that AI is helping to accomplish these efforts as well for professionals wise enough to engage in them. The traditional argument for "garbage in, garbage out" applies, but neural networks don't evaluate these kinds of limitations traditionally either. They think. And, let's be honest — even those who don't care to make that kind of investment upfront are realizing worthwhile productivity gains with AI regardless. It's just the power of this very different technology… Because it is intelligent — because it can reason through even our own bad habits to an extent — it will accelerate whatever effort we choose to put forward. So, if we want to preserve competitive advantage, then we can't afford to do less than our own, personal best, e.g., achieve good data hygiene, nor fail to embrace the best that AI can afford to us as it continues to gain agency (do work). That's the effect of "compound intelligence" in play.
The Truth
Who can deny the powerful ways that AI is being used — today — by people bringing it into their dealership responsibilities with their own initiative? Now consider that these are very seldom engineers and career technologists. They're industrious users of new tools — the pragmatic go-getters you'll find in every dealership.
If everyday people are increasingly solving problems in their dealerships with AI, then how much more credence should be placed in the engineers who recognized — years ago already — that "getting real work done" with AI would come in the form of "agents" and unattended "agentic workflows". We're talking about disciplined experts who have been dedicating 100% of their time to the exploration and advancement of high-reasoning AI that can use tools and data that we're all familiar with — and even new tools we'd otherwise have to find and train ourselves to use effectively. No, it's not all hype, and it's moving beyond just helpful.
At best, failure to acknowledge advancements in AI agents is an innocent omission that would be quickly conceded in friendly, responsible dialogue, over coffee, among colleagues. At worst, however, it represents a fear or lack of vision for where things are inevitably — and rapidly — going.
At Maximum Automotive Intelligence, we acknowledge the noise, believe that dealers need to be met where they're at, and should be shown where things are going — human/AI collaboration that will increasingly become more natural and productive. Do we have flashy demos that provide a window into this reality? Yes. Do they represent how far the technology has come and what will increasingly become commonplace? Absolutely. It's why we say, "No hype. Just more work done." And why we're building the infrastructure to "support and extend your existing team with Human/AI collaboration".
Learn more about us and our core beliefs on our About page.