AI adoption is becoming a test of agency

The tools are ready, but leaders still need to make time to use them.

Hi there,

This week’s newsletter is a little bit shorter than usual. You see, I’m getting increasingly disappointed at slow AI adoption.

There are clear reasons why this is the case. Business owners are busy, and AI is yet another thing they need to think about and execute on. Leaders are hesitant to change because of the associated risks, either real or imagined.

Workers, unless highly curious and capable, are reluctant to help automate themselves out of work because they don’t see a future for themselves as AI gets better - again, whether that fear is real or imagined.

There’s a reason I focus this newsletter on the people and change management side of things.

From my own experience and testing, I’m quite comfortable claiming that AI agents already outperform the median worker on a much higher proportion of business tasks than the median business owner or leader realises.

We can see this ourselves in the increased saturation of benchmarks and the increased leverage AI gives skilled workers. The relative improvement in model capability just since I rebooted this newsletter in February 2025 is insane in objective terms, however you wish to measure it.

I’ve been talking about this a lot in my videos and in other social media posts, but the overall anti-AI vibe is spreading a lot of inaccurate information about AI.

There are some people even sabotaging or undermining AI transformation efforts in their workplaces because leaders haven’t followed the advice in this newsletter: build a vision that paints a future for your people where they are empowered and taking advantage of AI.

This all feels so obvious and inevitable that it’s quite eye-opening to read something like this:

Enterprize Tasmania chief executive Brian Collins, who leads a group that supports start-ups in the state, said small businesses found it hard to know where to start with introducing AI.

“Most small businesses don’t have a dedicated tech person, so if you want to adopt AI then it’s competing with all the other day-to-day operations the owner of a business is needing to balance. 

“There’s also hundreds and hundreds of AI products … so there’s no clear starting point and that creates paralysis rather than creating action.”

All business owners need to do is just start. ChatGPT. Claude. Gemini. Grok. Muse. It just doesn’t matter anymore.

The models have become so much better that you can figure out a starting point just by using voice mode and explaining what your business is, how you work and what the basic steps are.

If you don’t make time for AI, your competitors and AI-first startups in your sector will.

I think this is all becoming a test of genuine agency. If you have agency, “hundreds and hundreds of AI products” isn’t a blocker.

Pushing through the noise is what the business owners I speak to are doing - not taking no for an answer. They’re pushing the tools to their limits to see what works and doesn’t work in their particular industry.

You strategise and figure out how to get around blockers. There are so many people on the internet who will help you for free if you read or watch their stuff, or you can pay them for help.

There is a limited window where your business can take advantage of AI to get some efficiencies and save more money before you start getting completely outclassed by AI-first startups in your industry.

I have also had a number of conversations recently where people with literally zero experience building things with the latest AI models and tooling flat-out deny what can or can’t be done, despite my extensive hands-on experience in this space.

So slow adoption is frustrating because this is all so painfully obvious to people with experience, yet many decision-makers can’t seem to accept that they need to pay for help or spend time themselves upskilling through hands-on experimentation.

If you’re a small firm, you can’t figure out how to deploy AI in your business without doing the experiments yourself - and if you can’t come up with AI use cases, you probably have bigger daily operational or tactical problems to fix first.

I started this newsletter because I wanted to help people and document my AI journey. I’ve enjoyed sharing and helping people think through and operationalise the operating model changes they need to make to survive the AI era.

Thank you to everyone who subscribes and engages with my content across all channels. Your support is much appreciated, and I’m grateful for the awesome conversations and relationships that have emerged from this newsletter!

If you want the back catalogue and ongoing access to the paid sections, upgrade your subscription now. I’m sharing actionable playbooks and insights to help you get AI to work better in your business.

Regards,

Brennan