Field guide
The 7 anchors of an AI business case.
Most AI proposals don't fail on the technology. They fail because the story leadership receives is missing structure. These are the seven anchors I look for in every business case — whether it's for an internal team, a customer pursuit, or a board ask.
Use it as a checklist. If any anchor is thin, the case will get polite nods and no budget.
Company context
Where does this company actually compete, and what are its current commitments? Without this, every recommendation sounds clever and lands generic.
Current challenges
Name the operational and commercial pain in the words leadership already uses. Win the language battle before the funding one.
Compelling event
Why now? A board commitment, a competitive move, a margin event. No compelling event, no decision — just a polite roadmap conversation.
Regulatory and risk pressure
What's tightening — data, sustainability, sector-specific rules? AI initiatives that quietly de-risk the business get funded faster than ones that only chase upside.
AI opportunity
Be specific. Which decisions get sharper, which cycles get shorter, which work shifts from internal grind to customer-facing time. Augmentation, not headcount math.
Business impact
Translate into the metrics the CFO already tracks: pipeline velocity, win rate, deal size, gross margin. If you can't put it in their language, it isn't a business case yet.
Approach
A credible 90-day path: who, what, in what order, against what evidence. Concrete enough to start on Monday, modest enough to survive contact with reality.
One last thing
The point isn't fewer people. It's the same people, doing higher-value work, with better evidence under them.