Accountability for the number

Five years in, we've learned one thing: an AI project without a locked number and accountability for it is not a project — it's a gift. Both sides pretend to work, and both walk away disappointed.

Accountability for the number isn't «we'll try to improve». It's a locked target, ownership for reaching it, and the terms under which we push to it. In our case — at our own cost, if we fall short.

How we build this with a client. Step 1 — find the process. Not «implement AI», but «close lead qualification in sales». A concrete spot in the business, with concrete people and concrete numbers.

Step 2 — compute baseline. How many people, how many hours, how much output today. Not «the COO's gut feeling» — a CRM export over 3 months. No baseline, no start.

Step 3 — fix the target. «Cut manual ops by 60%», «raise conversion into qualified lead by 40%», «drop response time from 8 hours to 15 minutes». One number, one measurement rule.

Step 4 — lock the commitment. The goal, the formula, the deadline, what counts as hit. And the flip side: what we do if it isn't hit. Usually «we come back and push to it at our own cost».

Clients sometimes push back: «you're over-engineering this». It's not. It's how we learn whether the task is real. If a company won't lock the number — it's not sure it needs this. And that means AI isn't the job right now.