Over the last two years I have seen many organisations rush into AI out of fear of being left behind. The problem is not the technology: it is starting from the tool instead of the business problem.
From the endless pilot to measurable impact
A pilot with no owner, no budget and no clear KPI is doomed to live forever in “trial” mode. The difference between companies that capture value with AI and those that only pile up demos comes down to three decisions:
- Pick a case with clear return, not the flashiest one.
- Assign business owners, not just technologists.
- Measure before and after with an indicator the leadership team cares about.
AI does not replace strategy
AI amplifies what you already have. If your processes are messy, AI will make them messy faster. That is why the first job is not training a model, but tidying up the data and processes it will operate on.
The right question is not “where do I add AI?”, but “which decision do I want to improve, and with what data?”.
In upcoming articles I will share concrete cases of how we put this into practice in environments with thousands of users and real-time operations.