52 INTERVIEW Taking agentic AI to heart Robbie Morrison explains how a customer-zero approach has built Velosio’s deep understanding of successful AI transformation Organisations want innovative AI that will deliver real-life results, and transformation specialists are using their own experience to prove what works. Gartner notes that a ‘customer zero’ approach – where providers are the first users of their own products and services – is an increasingly important way to boost quality, accelerate feedback loops and strengthen credibility with customers. Velosio is no stranger to this approach. Created from multiple businesses, the company has been its own AI proving ground for the past seven years. “In 2019, we started to consolidate systems and create one working data model across all the businesses,” says Robbie Morrison, chief executive officer of Velosio. “We’re a Microsoftfirst company, so we chose the Microsoft Dynamics platform and implemented all the systems we needed to run our business, from finance to customer relationship management and project operations.” A single, trusted data source was central to the company’s AI journey. “We put everything into a Microsoft Fabric environment so we have a single source of truth that we can point our AI and analytics against,” says Morrison. “To do that, we took the framework of the Microsoft ecosystem – with everything in the business apps layer – and built our agentic layers on top of it. When we needed to make third-party connectors through our external solutions, Microsoft Azure model context protocol servers and APIs allowed us to do that efficiently and get everything back into the Fabric environment for reporting and access.” With all the data in one place, Velosio uses Microsoft Entra ID to provide access with a single log-in, while Microsoft Purview ensures security and governance. This makes all the organisation’s data available to boost productivity, without compromising confidentiality. “AI can create unwanted access control issues if you don’t have a security model with good lockdown of the different permissions across your data set,” says Morrison. “Using Microsoft Purview, with a single ID with one security model across all the data, has allowed us to open it up to everyone who needs it.” Technology is only one part of any AI deployment. Velosio’s journey has given it a deep understanding of what people needed, too. “When we started rolling out various tools and processes, our workforce was worried about what it would mean for people’s jobs,” says Morrison. “A lot of change management was needed around that. We had to reassure people we weren’t trying to reduce our workforce; we just wanted to help them be more efficient.” A major initiative to accelerate Velosio’s enterprise resource planning implementations exemplifies those efficiency gains. BY JACQUI GRIFFITHS “ We put everything into a Microsoft Fabric environment so we have a single source of truth”
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