The 3 Non-Negotiables of Adding AI to Your Business

Over the last five years I've built 60+ end-to-end AI products and integrations for businesses, and I was doing it before LLMs were even a thing. In that time I've seen what separates a business that brings AI in smoothly from one that just creates more problems.

It's not a big team. Not expensive monthly costs. Not becoming technical yourself. Not turning into a project manager.

What actually matters are three non-negotiables you agree on upfront, before the first brick is laid. They shape the entire project, but they're all conversations you have at the very start. Get them right, and they work like a filter that keeps you on the right track the whole way through.

1. Pick the right problem

AI is not a plug-and-play thing that magically reaches into every part of your business from day one. Here's what you want at the start instead: take one very specific thing your business already does, and let AI do that same thing cheaper, faster, with less effort, or at a higher volume. That gives you a quick win, a real first insight, and actual value for the business, early.

The opposite of that is using AI just for the sake of using AI, without targeting something specific. That path very likely ends with you investing in projects that create no real value. This is one of the earliest decisions you'll make, and it's the one that decides whether you ever see a return at all.

2. Keep it simple

Building solutions with AI has gotten much easier. But a simple solution doesn't mean a basic one. Building a simple solution to a complex-looking problem still takes care and experience, and there are many ways to build the same solution.

One of my favorite ways to tell whether a solution is simple: can you understand it at a high level? That never means you need to be technical. Even the most complex topic has an explanation that makes you intuitively feel "yes, that makes sense." If you're struggling to grasp the core approach of a solution, that feeling might be right. A simple solution is, above all, understandable.

This principle has a very real cost side too. Doing the requirements analysis well, and designing solutions that don't lean on expensive monthly platforms, is what keeps running costs low. One comprehensive SaaS I built runs well under $100 per month for exactly this reason.

3. Make it outlast anyone

If you weren't here tomorrow, or the person who built it wasn't, would this still stand? The solution should belong to the business, not to any one person.

A few things decide that, and you can ask about all of them without being technical:

• How many external services does it depend on? More moving parts means more that can break and more people you stay dependent on. Fewer dependencies, less breakage.
• Are those parts proven, familiar things? A solid solution stands on solid ground, not on tools nobody's heard of that could disappear tomorrow.
• Could someone new pick it up tomorrow and keep it running? Not by reverse-engineering it for weeks, but because it's written down properly. That's what documentation is for.

If only one person understands the solution, you're stuck with that one person forever. A good build doesn't leave you dependent on whoever made it.

The whole point

A solid project is possible with these three: the right problem, a simple solution, and a system that outlasts anyone. And none of it requires you to build a team, pay for an expensive platform, become technical, or turn into a project manager.

If you're still discovering what AI could do for your business, that's a perfectly good place to start. I put together a free written guide with the key points plus more detail: get it here.

And if you're at the point of looking for one person to hand the whole thing to, end to end, that's exactly what I do.