'AI Everywhere' is over. It's time for AI accountability

In today's episode we speak to Samantha Garrett (AI & Automation Platform Lead at Canva) who reveals Canva's internal roadmap for deploying AI across business units, balancing user freedom with enterprise risk.

Canva's AI journey moved from "AI everywhere" to "AI impact" and then "AI native". Now Samantha Garrett believes the next phase is AI accountability. The experimentation honeymoon is ending, the bills are arriving, and organisations need to know whether their AI spend is creating genuine value.

Samantha explains why usage metrics are not the same as ROI, how to encourage experimentation without wasting money, and why AI financial literacy may become one of the most important leadership challenges of the next few years.

Key takeaways from this episode:

Multi-Model Strategy: Why Canva gives employees total choice between Claude, Glean, ChatGPT, and Gemini.

Automation vs. Pure AI: Why the biggest operational wins come from combining automation platforms with AI.

Measuring What Matters: Why traditional ROI frameworks fail for personal productivity, and how to measure real team transformation.

Navigating AI Fatigue: How leaders can support their teams through constant tech disruption and burnout.

Essential insights for CTOs, CDOs, and business leaders seeking a real-world playbook for enterprise AI adoption.