How IBM's Watson supports digital engagement and enablement (Video)

Learn more about machine learning and chatbots at KMWorld 2019,coming to Washington, DC, Nov. 5-7.

Watch the complete video of this keynote, Intrapreneurship & Learning: Tips & Tools, in the KMWorld Conference 2018 Video Portal.

In her keynote at KMWorld 2018, Phaedra Boinodiris, member of the IBM Academy of Technology (Blockchain, Games, Watson, Design), explored the power of strategy games and simulations to drive knowledge-sharing and innovation in businesses, improve engagement. and build more effective learning cultures.

To illustrate the value of improved "digital engagement an enablement" in organizations, Boinodiris walked KMWorld attendees through a project IBM's Corporate Citizenship group where it create an AI app to support math teachers. This project was the first course IBM created for K-12 education, she said, "where we wanted to teach kids about how to create not just chatbots but empathetic chatbots."

The key to the project was the bots' ability not just to engage in conversations but to mine and assess sentiment among users. "Is this person angry? Is this person sad?" By gauging sentiment and personality, Watson was able to curate "a highly customized conversation just for them."

In this particular project, the goal was to initiate and curate these conversations with students and applying them appropriately in an educational setting. "What was really important when working on the empathic conversation bot project was that this is most definitely a STEAM and not a STEM endeavor," she said. "because it is in fact knowledge of people, psychology, history, music, et cetera, that helps make that chat bot nurturing, empathetic."

Essential to the project was training the students in design thinking at the outset, and directing the chatbots into areas relevant to students' concerns. "One of the first classes we worked with wanted to create an empathetic chat bot that was able to work with other kids who were experiencing bullying or who were under a tremendous amount of stress. They were trying to figure out, 'Okay. On a scale of 1 to 10, if their stress is at a level 7, let's brainstorm about what kind of music we should play.'" By gauging a student's stress level, Boinodiris was able curate the conversation in such a way as to help reduce the stress.

"This really made a tremendous impression on me," Boinodiris said, "this idea that understanding people's behavior and the arts and history and strategy is vitally important to a project like this."

Many speakers have made their presentations available at www.kmworld.com/Conference/2018/Presentations.aspx.