I’ve had a lot of conversations lately on AI and one common theme shows up consistently: AI transformation/adoption has to come from the top.

That’s true of startups, scaling companies, and the enterprise customers they serve. If the C-suite isn’t on board, adoption lags.

It’s important to remember that not only in operations, but as we commercialize AI too.

But the inverse is also true. You can’t push consumption for its own sake. Amazon and Uber both learned that incentivizing for usage just produces internal AI slop.

“Show me the incentive and I’ll show you the outcome.”

The good news is that we’re still early. A recent BLS survey found only 1 in 5 companies are using AI. So if it feels like you’ve missed the boat, you haven’t.

The companies already rethinking pricing models, identifying new wallet share, and redefining what they sell are ahead. The AI era is just getting started and software’s demise was greatly overstated.