As business owners, we’re constantly looking for ways to work smarter, save time, and improve efficiency. That’s one of the reasons AI has become such a hot topic. Everywhere you look, someone is promising that AI can transform your business overnight.
The reality is a little more complicated.
I believe AI can be a powerful tool, but it isn’t a magic fix. Before any business starts thinking about AI implementation, I always encourage them to take a step back and look at something more fundamental: friction.
Friction is what happens when your business processes make things harder than they need to be. It’s the bottlenecks, repetitive tasks, disconnected systems and manual workarounds that quietly drain time, money and energy from your organisation.
The good news is that once you identify those points of friction, there are often opportunities to streamline, automate and improve. Sometimes AI plays a role in that. Sometimes it doesn’t. The key is understanding the problem before jumping to the solution.
What Does Business Friction Look Like?
One of the challenges with friction is that it often becomes invisible.
When you’ve been running a business for years, it’s easy to accept certain frustrations as “just the way things are”. Your team adapts. Workarounds develop. Processes evolve organically.
Nobody stops to ask whether there’s a better way.
It’s like a sticking door handle. Everyone in the office knows they have to jiggle it three times before it opens, so nobody thinks twice about it. Then a visitor arrives and asks a simple question: “Why don’t you just fix the handle?”
Business processes can be exactly the same.
Some common examples of friction include:
- Team members manually moving information from one system to another.
- Multiple platforms that don’t communicate with each other.
- Repeatedly asking the same questions because processes aren’t documented.
- Customer onboarding that relies on manual data entry.
- Information stored across emails, spreadsheets and various software platforms.
- Business owners making the same decisions repeatedly because there isn’t a clear framework in place.
None of these problems are dramatic in isolation. Together, however, they can create a significant drain on productivity and profitability.
Why AI Isn’t Always the Answer
One of the biggest misconceptions I see is the belief that AI will automatically fix inefficient processes.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that.
If a workflow is fundamentally flawed, adding AI won’t suddenly make it efficient, it’s not a magic wand 🪄. At best, you’ll automate a poor process. At worst, you’ll create an even bigger mess.
That’s why my approach always starts with the operational side of the business.
Before we talk about AI, we need to understand how the workflow currently operates. We need to identify what’s working, what’s causing delays, where decisions are being made, and where information is flowing.
Only then can we decide whether automation, AI, process redesign, or a combination of all three is the right solution.
Sometimes the answer is surprisingly simple.
A business may be manually entering customer information into multiple systems when a straightforward automation could solve the problem entirely. No AI required.
Other times, AI can provide significant value by supporting data analysis, content generation, knowledge management or decision-making processes.
The important thing is that the technology serves the process, not the other way around.
The Hidden Cost of Friction
Many business owners underestimate how expensive friction really is.
Because the costs are often spread throughout the business, they don’t always appear on a profit and loss statement. Instead, they show up as wasted hours, delayed projects, missed opportunities and leadership teams spending time on tasks that don’t require their expertise.
Let’s take something as simple as email management.
Imagine a business owner whose time is worth £200 per hour. If they’re spending an hour each working day dealing with tasks that could be streamlined, delegated or automated, that’s potentially £52,000 worth of leadership time being lost every year.
Now apply that thinking to onboarding, reporting, administration, follow-up processes, project management and internal communication.
The numbers quickly become significant.
More importantly, that’s time that could have been spent developing the business, strengthening client relationships, exploring new opportunities or focusing on strategic growth.
My Approach to AI Strategy
When I work with businesses, I’m not looking for ways to add AI for the sake of it.
I’m looking for opportunities to reduce friction.
That starts with understanding how the business operates today. Through an AI and operations audit, I help identify where time is being lost, where bottlenecks exist and where improvements could have the biggest impact.
From there, we can redesign workflows, introduce automations where appropriate, and implement AI tools that genuinely support the business.
Crucially, I also look at where human involvement should remain part of the process. The most effective systems are rarely fully automated. They combine technology with human expertise, judgement and relationship-building.
That’s where the real value lies.
From Friction to Flow
Business owners should be spending their time leading, innovating and growing their organisations, not battling inefficient processes.
The businesses that gain the greatest benefit from AI aren’t necessarily the ones using the most tools. They’re the ones that have taken the time to understand how their operations work and where improvements will make the biggest difference.
AI can absolutely be part of that journey.
But first, we need to identify the friction.
Curious about where friction might be hiding in your business? An AI and operations audit can reveal the bottlenecks, inefficiencies and opportunities that are limiting growth. Once you understand what’s slowing you down, you can make informed decisions about the processes, automations and AI solutions that will create the greatest impact. Get in touch to find out more.