Our department heads keep proposing AI projects that feel like technology experiments rather than business drivers. How do we force our leadership team to evaluate AI purely through an operational lens?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Ban the phrase AI project from your company vocabulary immediately. When leaders talk about technology initiatives, they fall in love with generative tools, fancy software demos, and corporate theater. None of that shows up on your balance sheet or improves enterprise value when preparing for an exit.

Reframe every single proposal as an operations-improvement project that happens to use machine learning as a footnote. Establish an evaluation rule for your leadership team: no AI proposal may be discussed unless it ties directly to a seat on the Accountability Chart and a specific number on the Scorecard.

Every operational proposal must answer three non-technical questions:

- Which documented Core Process does this streamline, and what specific step is being automated?
- How many hours per week does an employee in this seat currently spend executing this task manually?
- Where does the recovered capacity go, and what measurable impact will it have on our gross margin or revenue capacity?

If a department head cannot articulate the manual friction, the labor drag, and the bottom-line financial outcome, the proposal is rejected. By focusing entirely on eliminating cumbersome tasks and building system-dependent operations, you strip away the technology hype and ensure every dollar invested delivers a tangible return.