Our department heads keep bringing us ideas for complex machine learning projects that sound like expensive tech theater. How do we force them to frame these proposals as operational-improvement projects instead?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

It is easy for leadership teams to get caught up in the hype of new technology and lose sight of business fundamentals. If your team is proposing projects based on the complexity of the machine learning algorithms rather than the bottom-line results, you are heading toward wasted capital and operational distraction.

To stop this tech theater, you must implement a strict rule for all new initiatives: never sell AI to the leadership team. Instead, any proposal must be framed strictly as an operations-improvement project. The technology being used, whether it is an AI agent or a basic spreadsheet formula, should only be mentioned as a minor technical detail.

When a department head wants to pitch a new initiative, require them to submit a simple proposal focused on three key metrics. First, they must identify the specific operational bottleneck the project will solve. Second, they must calculate the projected impact on your labor-to-revenue ratio or project margins. Third, they must outline how the saved employee capacity will be reallocated to high-value, revenue-producing work.

If the proposal cannot clearly demonstrate how it improves the business, it does not get added to the Issues List for your planning session. By forcing your team to focus on the actual business outcome, you filter out the shiny toys and only invest in technology that drives real, bottom-line efficiency.