tech
Executive Briefing: Stop Asking If AI Can Do This. Start Asking What Shape the Work Is.
Every serious AI conversation eventually turns into the same practical question. Should we hire someone for this? Should we automate it? Should we buy a tool? Should we build the workflow ourselves? Or should we wait because the models are changing so fast that anything we build today may be obsolete in six months?
TL;DR
- Decisions about AI implementation should be framed as work-shaping questions, not just AI questions.
- The suitability of AI depends on factors like task repetition, cost of errors, and need for judgment.
- Executives must treat AI as a capital allocation problem, considering the potential upside and downside of each investment motion.
- Incorrect decisions can lead to building costs around disappearing scarcity or breaking business processes that rely on human judgment.
- A six-dimension scoring framework can help route workflows to the appropriate investment motion (automate, build, buy, hire, or wait).
- Over 40% of agentic AI projects are predicted to be canceled by 2027 due to cost, unclear value, or inadequate risk controls.
- The executive role is evolving, requiring a new leadership skill in routing logic to guide AI investment conversations.
- Tools like a decomposer, scorer, pressure test, and describability gate can aid in the AI investment decision-making process.