3.4 Economics
Prove the value of AI at scale
To sustain AI investment and expand its scope, you need to move beyond cost-cutting narratives and build a case for business impact. You need a new economic model; one that redefines success, blends old budget lines, and links performance directly to business outcomes.
The product works. Okay, now let's make sure: does it work at scale? Are people using it effectively? Can we measure a KPI change? Can we link that KPI to a real productivity improvement?
When done right, AI goes far beyond improving support efficiency. It rewires the financial model: breaking the link between support costs and revenue growth, and turning support into a contributor to customer activation, retention, and lifetime value.
Stop measuring AI like software and thinking about ROI in isolation. Start treating your AI Agent as a new workforce capability that changes how your support function creates and captures value.
Even if it's breakeven now or slightly more expensive, we all think this is a really good investment that will pay off exponentially. It's just a matter of time and making sure that we see when that happens and go all in to shift the way we operate, hire, and staff at that point.
