The Deadly "AI Slow Roll" in SaaS: It May Cost You Everything
"Folks running the 2021 playbook will soon be out of a job."
I'm seeing an alarming trend across the SaaS landscape that's going to separate winners from losers in the next 18 months: The AI Slow Roll.
You know what I'm talking about:
It's the VP of Engineering who's "still evaluating Windsurf and Cursor" but says it's still a little bit early.
It's the Product leader confidently declaring AI "isn't ready for prime time because of hallucinations."
It's the CRO insisting that "customers all want to talk to a human" and that "a great sales rep beats AI any day of the week."
Let me be crystal clear: Change fast or die.
The Best Are Already 50% Automated
While you're "evaluating options," your most dangerous competitors have already transformed their operations:
Top-tier tech companies are automating 50% of their code production with AI tools
Even conservative enterprises like Salesforce have hit 20% automation
The gap between AI-native and AI-hesitant companies is widening every single week
The ROI isn't theoretical anymore. Companies deploying AI at scale are seeing 30-40% productivity gains in engineering, 25% faster time-to-close in sales, and customer satisfaction scores increasing when AI is properly deployed in support.
"Hallucinations" Are Just an Excuse for Inaction
When executives tell me "we're concerned about hallucinations," what I really hear is: "we don't want to do the work."
This problem is already solved by companies who approach AI deployment seriously:
Implement proper training and fine-tuning
Build exception handling into your workflows
Create human escalation paths for edge cases
Start with non-critical use cases and expand
Your competition has already figured this out. They're not waiting for perfect AI - they're iterating toward excellence while you're stuck in planning meetings.
AI Is Going to Absolutely Devastate Mediocre Go-To-Market Teams, Especially SMB Teams and Mediocre CS Teams
Let's be honest about your customer-facing teams:
Most of your AEs take 24+ hours to respond to hot leads
Your SDRs send generic, template-heavy outreach
Your CSMs barely show up prepared to QBRs. Be honest here.
Your support team has 12+ hour response times
Many of your customers would already prefer interacting with an S-tier AI over your B-tier humans. And with each passing month, that AI gets better while your humans... stay the same.
The mediocre middle of go-to-market teams is about to be hollowed out, leaving only elite relationship builders and strategic consultants at the top. Everyone else becomes expendable.
If You Don't See the Change, It's You
The single most reliable indicator I've found of which B2B companies will thrive in the next wave? How quickly their executives mobilized meaningful AI adoption.
Not discussion. Not evaluation. Not roadmaps. Actual adoption.
I've watched companies 1/10th your size completely transform their operations in 90 days while your leadership team is still debating "potential use cases" and "risk mitigation."
Don't let perfect be the enemy of done. Your competition isn't.
Three Things To Do Monday Morning:
Identify your highest-leverage AI deployment area (hint: it's usually where you have the most manual, repetitive work)
Set aggressive 30-60-90 day metrics for AI adoption with clear ownership
Make it a CEO/Board-level priority - this isn't a nice-to-have technology project
Treat this like the existential threat it is. Because for most B2B companies moving too slowly on AI, that's exactly what it's going to be. Your competition, new and even old, is going to lap you. Even if you can't see it yet.
Change fast. Or lose everything.
I'm not exaggerating to make a point. This might be your last, best wake-up call.
The pace of change is faster than anything we've ever seen in SaaS and B2B.
