Establishing an AI Business Strategy and Enablement Foundation

The client is a mid-sized industrial software and services organization operating a complex product ecosystem that supports mission-critical workflows for its customers. As interest in AI accelerated across the business, leadership sought a structured way to evaluate opportunities, align stakeholders, and enable teams to adopt AI responsibly and effectively.

The client recognized AI’s potential to improve efficiency, decision-making, and product differentiation—but faced common early-stage challenges:

• Unclear prioritization of AI opportunities across products and functions

• Varying levels of data readiness and AI maturity

• Risk of fragmented experimentation without governance or alignment

• Limited internal experience applying AI tools to real production workflows

• Desire to empower development teams without introducing security, compliance, or quality risks

The organization needed a partner to bring structure, clarity, and momentum to its AI journey—without over-engineering or rushing adoption.

Connective partnered closely with executive leadership, product management, engineering, and IT to deliver a pragmatic, phased AI strategy grounded in business value.

The engagement focused on two complementary tracks:

AI Business Strategy & Governance

• Facilitated AI use-case discovery and prioritization workshops

• Assessed data readiness and organizational AI maturity

• Established responsible AI guiding principles and governance considerations

• Identified high-impact opportunities aligned to business goals

• Delivered a tactical roadmap to guide near- and mid-term AI investment

AI Enablement for Software Development

• Conducted hands-on, in-person workshops for development teams

• Paired with engineers on real codebases—not theoretical examples

• Introduced best practices for tools such as GitHub Copilot and other GenAI coding assistants

• Helped teams identify workflows where AI could meaningfully augment productivity

• Accelerated confidence, fluency, and internal adoption of AI tools

Throughout the engagement, Connective operated in a player-coach model—educating teams while ensuring recommendations were realistic, secure, and aligned with the client’s operating environment.

• A clear, executive-aligned AI business strategy and prioritization framework

• Defined AI governance principles to guide responsible adoption

• A practical AI roadmap tied to measurable business outcomes

• Hands-on developer enablement that improved real-world productivity

• A shared understanding across leadership and teams of where—and how—to apply AI

• Improved clarity and alignment around AI investments and priorities

• Reduced risk of fragmented or ad-hoc AI experimentation

• Faster, more confident adoption of AI tools within development teams

• Stronger connection between AI strategy, product strategy, and delivery execution

• A scalable foundation for expanding AI capabilities over time

By combining strategic AI planning with practical, hands-on enablement, Connective helped the client move from AI curiosity to confident execution—establishing a foundation that balances innovation, governance, and real business value.