Leaders don’t need more data, writes Ciarán Quilty from Intuit. They need AI that surfaces what actually matters.
Running a business has never been noisier. Calls, customers, campaigns, all competing for your attention.
Intuit’s new Growth Gap Report shows that UK small and medium-sized businesses are missing out on nearly 8% of annual revenue (an average of £121,000 per firm) simply because time and focus are consumed by routine work and disjointed systems.
“AI’s real value isn’t that it works faster but helps leaders think better. By noticing what humans can’t, it restores clarity to decisions that were starting to rely on guesswork”
Leadership energy is spread thin across fragmented tools and constant decision-making. 40% of business leaders remain heavily involved in daily operations, while only 5% feel confident delegating major decisions.
The problem isn’t a lack of ambition but bandwidth. Most leaders don’t lack information, just the time to interpret it. This is where AI starts to earn its place both as a faster worker and a sharper decision maker.
From automation to attention
Much of the conversation about AI has focused on outputs such as speed, scale and automation. Those matter, but they aren’t the breakthrough.
AI matters when it helps leaders notice what they’d otherwise miss. For example, flagging a margin shift before the quarter closes or showing that three late payers are all in the same region. You’ll know it really hits the mark when it prompts the question: what pattern is hiding in plain sight?
This turns AI from task automation into strategic sense-making. Think of this as ‘Attention Intelligence’ with tools that help you focus on what matters most, when it matters.
Small and mid-sized businesses that get the most from AI treat it as a partner rather than a replacement. For example, the finance lead spots pricing drift because the system flagged it early, explained the cause, and proposed a small price test. The sales manager spends time on five high-probability leads instead of fifty cold ones because the agent prioritised them and drafted the outreach.
Similarly, revenue forecasting shifts from hunches to hypotheses because every projection arrives with reasons, not just numbers. In each case, AI narrows the field of attention so people can make better calls faster.
The confidence gap
Business leaders understand the potential of AI. Research consistently shows that most view AI as critical to competitiveness. Yet many don’t have a clear plan or a way to measure value.
On the ground, the Growth Gap report found that leaders lose nearly five hours a week to decision fatigue and miss an average of 58% of potential growth opportunities because decisions pile up faster than they can be made.
It’s not that leaders lack ideas. Three in four said they’ve abandoned new initiatives this year. The opportunity is real, but so is the confusion. Hence, this isn’t a question of whether AI creates advantage but which system can actually capture it.
The first returns will come where time and confidence are already thin: cash flow, customer retention, and pricing. Firstly, cash improves when late payers are identified before they become a problem. Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index (2025) shows small firms spend 36% of their time on administrative work and cite cash flow management as a top three stress factor.
Next, churn drops when engagement or sentiment shifts trigger an early response. And finally, margins hold when small pricing changes are caught before they become losses.
These aren’t futuristic scenarios. They are examples of how data, when organised by AI, gives leaders room to act before the damage is done. In business, timing often matters more than the decision itself.
Building trust in the loop
In the report, nearly two in five UK firms now use AI across finance, marketing, and operations, with the heaviest adopters saving the equivalent of a full working day per week.
“When growth is held back by noise and not ambition or tech, the leaders who close that gap first will be the ones who use AI to think better, as well as act faster.”
Those same firms show higher “readiness” such as better system flow, faster decisions, and greater confidence in delegation. This points to AI’s real value in restoring headroom for better judgment (and not necessarily replacing work).
Using AI well doesn’t mean giving up control. It means drawing clearer boundaries. Automate the routine; keep judgment where context matters.
Trust builds when the hand-offs are explicit. For example, when people know what the system did, what they approved, and why. The best setups log this automatically, creating a shared memory between human and machine. It’s less about replacing instinct and more about informing it.
The simplest way to test AI’s value is through questions, not features.
List a few decisions that consistently slow you down e.g. credit terms, hiring calls, pricing reviews, inventory bets. For each, write one plain question that would help you move faster: Which invoices are likely to run late next month? Which product lines are slipping below margin? Which leads match our last three wins?
If the system can answer those questions clearly and early, it’s working. If it can’t, change the question or the data feeding it.
Start small, review weekly, adjust thresholds for what can be automated and what needs approval. Progress comes from iteration, not overhaul.
Asking better questions
AI’s real value isn’t that it works faster but helps leaders think better. By noticing what humans can’t, it restores clarity to decisions that were starting to rely on guesswork.
The Growth Gap study defines readiness as the ability to see clearly, decide confidently, and act without friction. AI can accelerate all three but only when it helps leaders ask sharper questions.
When growth is held back by noise and not ambition or tech, the leaders who close that gap first will be the ones who use AI to think better, as well as act faster.
When technology prompts curiosity instead of distraction, the conversation shifts from what AI can do to what people can see. That’s when decisions get sharper, and confidence returns.
Top image: AI generated
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