Prioritizing AI: Value, Scope, and Customer Impact

Understanding the scope for success

Once we have a list of the highest-value AI enhancements, we can then start to prioritize them into a list of most to least scope. Scope includes not only the time and effort required to complete a body of work but also the cost and skill level required to do so. Given that we’re talking about AI products here, it may not be as straightforward to understand what will require the most effort, time, cost, and skill. Often, we don’t know this until we’re well on our way to building out these features, but do our best to create enough of a stacked order from most to least effort for this list.

Balancing investment and effort

This list won’t be an absolute source of truth, and it doesn’t have to be. It also doesn’t necessarily mean that the items that involve the least effort will get built first, but it’s important to establish which kinds of enhancements will require more of an investment from the company to complete. Understanding the variety in terms of effort is most important from a planning and resource management perspective. If certain features need to be built, and they do require a lot of effort, time, or skill that we might not conveniently have, knowing this will help with forecasting and making the necessary plans in the future to obtain it.

Preparing leadership