There's a lot of noise about AI right now. Most of it is written for big companies with IT departments. This is the honest version for everyone else.
Where AI genuinely earns its keep
Handling words. Drafting emails, summarizing long documents, writing first versions of proposals and job posts. If a task starts with a blank page, AI gets you 80% there in seconds — and you stay in control of the final word.
Answering the same questions. A well-set-up assistant can answer routine customer questions from your own documents — accurately, politely, around the clock — and hand anything unusual to a human.
Reading and sorting. Pulling data out of invoices, receipts, and forms. Categorizing messages. Flagging what needs your attention. The quiet, repetitive reading that eats your admin time.
Connecting your tools. AI plus automation means your systems talk to each other: a signed contract triggers the invoice, the invoice triggers the project folder, the folder triggers the welcome email. You do nothing.
Where it doesn't (yet)
Anything where a wrong answer is expensive and unsupervised — final legal wording, firing decisions, money moving without review. AI drafts; a human decides. Any consultant who tells you otherwise is selling something.
The honest starting point
You don't need an "AI strategy." You need a list of the tasks stealing your week, sorted by what's easiest to hand off. That list usually has surprises on it — and the first three items are usually cheaper to fix than one month of doing them by hand.
That's exactly what I build with owners in a strategy session. Or start with a free 20-minute call — I'll show you three things you could automate this week.