What’s really holding companies back when it comes to AI?

I’ll save you from scrolling and jump right to the answer: what’s really holding companies back when it comes to AI is the same thing they’ve likely been avoiding for years: implementing proper systems and processes.

It isn’t flashy or sexy but the truth is that very few companies have the systems and processes in place that would allow successful AI implementation.

Business 101: You need to have a strong and stable business foundation before you can implement ANY improvements and automations, and this is magnified with AI due to its limited capacity.

Most companies push this foundational phase of business off as long as possible, thinking it’s only going to slow things down and cost money, when they want to focus on profits and growth. But this is short-sighted. A stable business foundation with proper systems and processes is what ensures you can successfully grow and scale your business and profits - not just in the short-term, but over the long-term.

Our clients typically see the benefits from our improvements in the PNL 5+ years after implementation while continuing to further improvements and growth. Work that simply wouldn’t be possible without the proper foundation in place first.

What happens when you implement AI without strong business systems and processes? Conversations move into weirdly generic business ideas and principals while the emergence of 40+ page documents of AI Slop become the bottleneck to any forward motion. Working with a company that was self-proclaimed to be at the “ top 1% of AI-adoption “; I can’t tell you the number of hours I wasted reading and trying to fix the generic, sub-par content that wasn’t even applicable to their business.

I have yet to come across a high-level document from AI within any client work that I have seen or observed but that’s mostly because people have no idea what “AI” is, how it “works”, nor how to use it. The way many leaders are using AI, the things they’re trying to create and implement with AI - tells me they don’t understand what it is nor how it works.

AI or Artificial Intelligence is a marketing term to sell you their product. Just like “natural” means nothing, “AI” means nothing as well.

There is no intelligence, it’s predictive and looks at highest probability. AI doesn’t know what’s right or wrong, it doesn’t know what will work or be successful in any business and definitely not what would be successful for a specific business. AI doesn’t know what’s “true” or “false” and can’t apply reason, logic or understanding to situations and scenarios.

Garbage in, garbage out. Why does AI produce so much garbage? Currently AI is training on garbage - Reddit threads with angry keyboard warriors’ opinions, Wikipedia fantasy that anyone can make up, etc. If you’re sourcing the materials for your work from a garbage can - you’re going to get garbage and the AI sales teams don’t care about your results. They care about their income and bonuses tied to selling you on something that AT BEST doesn’t work for you, but more likely doesn’t work period.

I’m all for efficiency and automation - I built my career on it and thoughtful implementation considerations like Six Sigma ensures you can’t tank your business and/or product or service while implementing automations.

Throwing out or ignoring solid business foundations may seem like a win in the short term but very quickly are these wins going to turn into nightmares – costs you can’t cover and can never be justified; brand and reputation damage that would take years and millions to rebuild; not to mention the cost to fix these things after you’ve alienated or possibly eliminated competent staff.

There’s something to be said for business continuity and maintaining solid business foundations - in fact those are the things that will allow you to leverage AI - not this fantasy world that’s being sold in hopes of avoiding reality.

What can you do? Build the solid business foundations needed to support business improvements including automations and AI. Then get to work implementing improvements that ELEVATE your product and profits while using a solid and well-executed change management plan.

Taking the time to do the right things in the right order will lead to more success both today and in the long term.

Read more about successful AI implementation with the “3 Must’s for Executives and Leaders to Avoid AI Psychosis”.