People are the key to solving the city’s challenges

There’s a water leak in the school kitchen on Monday morning. Someone writes a service request about it in their own words, and at the other end of the chain, another person reads it, assesses the urgency, finds the right person to carry out the work and enters the same details into another system. At Tampereen Tilapalvelut, around 30,000 such work orders are generated every year.

These are precisely the kinds of situations where artificial intelligence can bring the greatest value to a city.

Tampere Tilapalvelut, the organisation responsible for the City of Tampere’s property portfolio, has solved the challenge described above with the help of artificial intelligence. Today, a service request moves directly into a work queue. AI extracts information from the text submitted by the customer, interprets unclear wording and transfers the information into the back-end system. It then routes the task to the appropriate maintenance professional and even ensures that the work is completed and that follow-up records are entered correctly. Previously, all of this was done manually. At the same time, errors have been reduced because information only needs to be entered once and is transferred accurately throughout the process.

The benefits are evident throughout the entire chain. The property manager receives the information they need for their work along with the task, and the person who made the service request receives a more consistent standard of service. At the same time, management can now clearly see who is responsible for what and at what stage the work is at. Previously, this information would have had to be compiled manually from multiple sources.

There are several lessons that can be drawn from this practical example, but in my view the most important is that technology enabled the entire process to be redesigned for the better. AI plays a central role in the solution, but it also required conventional automation, agreed operating rules and considerable work to ensure that information flows smoothly from one system to another. AI alone did not fix the process. The greatest benefits came from redesigning the operating model, with technology acting as the enabler.

The Tampere AI programme is built around applications such as this. We address specific, real-world needs whilst simultaneously developing the City of Tampere’s own expertise. Every time we apply AI to a real-world need, we learn more about the types of tasks it is best suited to and the conditions under which a working solution should be rolled out elsewhere in the municipality.

Right now, this work is being carried out across a broad front. Different service areas are currently reviewing their day-to-day operations, identifying for themselves the areas where AI would be most beneficial, and setting their own targets for its use. This is important because the best use cases are rarely dictated from above, but are found where the work and its real bottlenecks are understood.

Data determines how far we can go

One prerequisite for successful AI adoption stands above all others: data. If the data is incomplete, out of date or described differently across various systems, even the best AI will not produce a reliable result.

In Tampere, the quality of data and the interoperability of systems have been improved for a long time. This work isn’t as immediately visible as a new application, but it largely determines the extent to which AI can be reliably utilised.

That is why, before procuring new systems, I always ask two questions:

1. does data flow out of the systems in a controlled manner, and

2. can the system’s functions be accessed via interfaces and automated, or is their use tied to manual human intervention?

The latter is easily overlooked. Artificial intelligence is only truly useful when it can access the necessary data and also carry out tasks – that is, record, retrieve and process information just as an employee would.

What does this mean for work?

Many people are wondering whether this will lead to job losses. I won’t make any promises I can’t keep. Decisions on the city’s resources are made in the budget, and these are political choices. I can tell you what I’m aiming for myself. I want to help eliminate those parts of the job that nobody needs: double-entering data, searching for information and asking the same question over and over again. Once those are eliminated, what remains is work that requires judgement, expertise and the ability to engage with other people. There is more of that work in the municipality than we have time to do.

There are also, quite rightly, economic expectations placed on artificial intelligence, as needs are growing but resources are not. However, simply acquiring the tool does not generate savings. Savings only materialise once we understand what problem we are trying to solve and how the work is currently carried out.

I would like to see AI used even more in licensing services, decision-making, the use of research-based data and many other municipal tasks. The aim is the same in every instance. Technology must help us carry out these tasks more effectively. In practice, this means, for example, that once the municipality has requested a piece of information, it will not be requested again, and an application will not be held up waiting for something that was already known from the outset. We still have some way to go, but the direction is clear and the first steps have already been taken.

The best ideas emerge where the work happens

The best opportunities for AI are found where residents are waiting for answers, where employees are transferring the same information from one system to another, or where good decisions are delayed because the overall situation is unclear. If you recognise such a situation in your own daily work, please let me know. I’m always happy to receive ideas, and we’re currently developing ways to bring them together, first within the city and later on a wider scale.

Not everything needs to be solved with artificial intelligence, but when it genuinely helps, it’s worth seeking a solution together and implementing it skilfully. It is people who solve the city’s challenges, and my role is to ensure that those working for the city have the best possible information, tools and working methods to do so.