A Bad Process, Finished Quicker. What Leaders Miss Before They Add AI, with Tom Altman

Most AI efforts do not stall on the technology. They speed up a process nobody has looked at closely. Fractional CTO/CIO Tom Altman explains why AI takes a bad process and makes it finish quicker, why the trouble lives in the handoffs, and what leaders should tell their people about AI.

TOPICS COVERED

Why AI makes a bad process finish quicker

Where data and process problems hide: the handoffs

What AI can take off a staff accountant's desk today

Why ERP and CRM come before new AI tools

How goals and context keep AI from drifting

Why people fear AI, and what leaders should tell them

New jobs and AI on the org chart

One mundane task to try with AI this week

(00:00) Welcome and Introduction(00:58) Meet Tom Altman, Fractional CTO/CIO(01:55) What the C-Suite Misses Before Adding AI(02:46) A Bad Process, Finished Quicker(03:32) Why the Trouble Lives in the Handoffs(04:30) Over-Reliance on AI and the Accounts Payable Match(05:31) Lock Down ERP and CRM Before Building on Top(06:23) Inside an AI Symposium: Training People to Think(07:51) Goals, Context, and AI Drift(08:57) Training the Whole Workforce on AI(10:43) Vibe Coding and the Paper-Sketch Prototype(12:46) The People Side: Fear, Jobs, and Telling the Truth(15:28) New Jobs and AI on the Org Chart(17:15) Solopreneurs and AI Agents(17:56) When to Bring In a Fractional Technology Leader(19:38) One Thing to Try This Week

ABOUT THE GUESTTom Altman is a fractional CIO and CTO at Altus CXO, where he helps companies adopt technology that actually sticks. He runs ClearXO, Altus CXO's one-week operational assessment that maps how a business really works across people, process, systems and data, before anyone buys software or switches on AI. He lives in Iowa, rides motorcycles, and has a weakness for Volkswagens.