Define the business goal before you buy the AI tool
Banks that set business goals before buying AI see better returns. Half of enterprises already running AI in production still can’t prove ROI.
Return on AI: Weekly Digest – August 18, 2026
Twelve findings on AI infrastructure spending, productivity measurement, procurement automation and governance, including new evidence on how sequencing decisions affects returns.
Our take
The sequencing matters. Banks that defined business goals before purchasing AI tools report better returns than those that bought first, and half of enterprises running production AI still can’t demonstrate ROI. When the tool comes before the goal, there is nothing to measure against.
Where goals were clear, results followed: a 21% reduction in developer effort, and procurement cycles cut in half by agentic AI. HBR adds a useful caution: speed alone isn’t an advantage. Judgment about where to apply AI is.
What to do about it
- Write down the business outcome and the metric before evaluating vendors.
- Apply capital-expenditure discipline to AI infrastructure spending.
- Prioritize use cases where speed translates directly into value, like procurement and development cycles.