AI Strategy Is Not Tool Shopping
Every week I talk to a CEO or CMO who starts the conversation the same way. "We're looking at ChatGPT Enterprise" or "should we be using Claude?" or "our competitor just deployed Copilot."
They're starting with tools. That's backwards.
The Tool-First Trap
When you start with tools, you end up with a solution looking for a problem. You buy licenses, run pilots, and six months later you're wondering why nobody's using the thing you just paid for.
I've seen this play out dozens of times. The pattern is always the same:
- Someone on the team gets excited about a new AI tool
- They demo it to leadership
- Leadership says "let's try it"
- Three months of pilot chaos
- Low adoption, unclear ROI
- "AI doesn't work for us"
The problem was never the AI. The problem was not knowing what you were trying to solve.
Strategy First, Tools Second
Here's what I tell every client: before you touch a single tool, you need to answer three questions.
Where are you losing money or time in your growth engine right now? Not where AI could theoretically help. Where are you actually bleeding today? What's slow, broken, or manual?
What decisions are you making with gut feel that should be data-driven? Most growth teams are still making critical decisions based on last month's spreadsheet and someone's instinct. AI's biggest immediate value is often in decision intelligence, not automation.
What would 10x improvement in one area look like? Not incremental improvement. Dramatic improvement. This question forces you to think about transformation, not optimization.
The 90-Day Approach
Once you have clear answers, you can build a roadmap that makes sense. I use a 90-day planning horizon because it's long enough to get meaningful results and short enough to stay accountable.
The first 30 days are about diagnosis. Understanding data infrastructure, team capabilities, and where the real opportunities are.
Days 30-60 are about building the first use case. Not the biggest one. The one most likely to work, deliver clear ROI, and build internal confidence.
Days 60-90 are about scaling what works and planning the next phase.
The Bottom Line
AI strategy is not about finding the best tool. It's about understanding your business well enough to know where AI creates the most value, then executing on that with discipline.
Start with the business problem. The right tools become obvious once you know what you're solving for.