AI Strategy: When Do You Need One & How to Create It (The HOBA Tech Way)
Business leaders and AI working hand-in-hand — when to create your AI strategy and how to do it the HOBA Tech way
🤫 Why You’ll Want to Read This
Imagine you’ve bought a flashy sports car—but you don’t know where you’re going, what roads to take, or whether you even need one right now.
That’s what many businesses experience with AI: the hype’s there, but strategy is missin
In this blog, we’ll:
➡️ Clarify what an AI strategy is and when it’s needed.
➡️ Unpack how HOBA Tech’s business-first model flips the narrative.
➡️ Walk through a clear, beginner-friendly six-step process.
➡️ Share tips, common pitfalls, and how to stay efficient.
➡️ Compare the UK’s national AI strategy against broader strategic advice.
What You’ll Learn in This Article:
Let’s get into it 👉
What is an AI Strategy—and when should you consider one?
An AI strategy is the roadmap that aligns AI initiatives with overarching business goals—it answers the 5W1H (Who, What, Why, How, When, Where) in the context of strategic transformation, not just tech experimentation. Businesses need one when AI emerges as a potential catalyst for growth, efficiency, or innovation—but only when it’s married to real business outcomes, not just shiny tech deployments.
At HOBA Tech, our stance is clear: Technology enables strategy—it doesn’t become the strategy. In a sea of tech-first narratives, we take a contrarian stand: AI supports business-led digital transformation, not the other way round.
Who is it for?
Our model is ideal for B2B organizations—from growing SMEs to enterprise clients—that want AI to accelerate outcomes (e.g. operations, customer experience, product innovation) while anchoring decisions in strategic value, not hype.
Step-by-Step Explanation: HOBA Tech’s Six-Step AI Strategy
Here’s how you structure a business-led AI strategy with HOBA Tech’s six-step design process, anchored by the 5W1H:
1. Why? (Strategic Intent & Vision)
- Define the business objective—growth, efficiency, resilience.
- Ask: “What business outcome is AI going to accelerate?” (e.g. The UK's National AI Strategy emphasizes that "AI will be central to how we drive growth and enrich lives" - focusing on transformational business outcomes rather than simply digitizing existing processes)
- UK National AI Strategy
2. Who? (Stakeholders & Roles)
- Identify the decision-makers, users, and champions (especially HR's role in upskilling and adoption)
3. What? (Use Cases & Prioritisation)
- Choose high-impact use cases based on feasibility, value and alignment with business goals (Google Cloud emphasizes aligning AI with strategic priorities)
- Redesign processes before automating (Bain's advice)
4. How? (Technology, Data, Governance)
- Plan infrastructure, tools, vendors, and governance frameworks—including ethical, risk, and explainability protocols. Gartner emphasizes vision, values, risk and adoption pillars for GenAI strategy
- UK regulation principles include safety, transparency, fairness, accountability
- Gartner
5. When & Where? (Roadmap & Timing)
- Balance “big bets” with “small wins” (Bain’s dual-speed strategy)
- Narrow scope to scale effectively; Clean data for faster deployment—“good enough, not perfect” (Bain)
6. Continuous Oversight & Control
- Create governance bodies, risk frameworks, and internal marketplaces to track, iterate, and scale—important to unstuck AI transformation
👏 “AI is not your business strategy. It’s the enabler of it. Get that wrong, and you’ve already lost” 🚫🤖 #BusinessTransformation #AIstrategy #HOBAtech 🚀
Tips to Do It Efficiently
💡 Tip 1: Start small, scale fast
Pilot high-impact use cases and build momentum (big bets + small wins).
💡 Tip 2: Empower HR and upskill across the board
Allow organic adoption and culture shift.
💡 Tip 3: Simplify first, then automate
redesign processes before layering AI.
Troubleshooting & FAQs - Common Mistakes
❌ Mistake 1: Treating AI as the strategy
Consequence: Misaligned outcomes, wasted investment.
❌ Mistake 2: Automating without redesigning.
Result: Accelerated inefficiencies, not transformation
❌ Mistake 3: Ignoring people and governance.
Without HR, ethics/governance, and explainability, adoption stalls, and risks escalate (Wikipedia)
A practical guide to applying AI with the HOBA® agile framework so you deliver transformation faster, with less risk and more ROI.
- How AI accelerates each step of HOBA®
- Best practices for safe, scalable AI adoption
👏 "The question isn’t if you need an AI strategy, it’s when — and when you do, it must be business-led, not technology-driven" ⏳💡 #AI #DigitalTransformation #Leadership.
Comparing AI Strategy Frameworks
UK Government (National AI Strategy & AI Opportunities Action Plan)
Long-term vision: Make UK an AI superpower via investment in talent, compute, regulation (pro-innovation) (Gov.uk)
Action elements: AI growth zones, data library, supercomputing, energy council, streamlined planning, pro-innovation regulation, and new public AI bodies (UK Sovereign AI, AI Energy Council) (The Gaurdian)
Thought Leaders (Bain, Google, Gartner, etc.)
Focus on business alignment, process redesign, metrics, use-case prioritisation, governance, and scaling responsibly
HOBA Tech’s Distinctive Positioning
- Business-led transformation first; AI as enabler.
- Root strategy in the 5W1H and six-step process to stay practical, scalable, and aligned.
- Governance, performance, culture, and scaling are not afterthoughts—they’re the core.
⚠️ "AI should support your transformation — not lead it. GPT-5 can accelerate change, but only if you’ve built the business case first." ⚙️ #Transformation #AIinBusiness #ConsultingReimagined 💡
✅ Conclusion & Next Steps
AI is powerful, but without business strategy, it’s like a car with no destination.
At HOBA Tech, we design AI-integration strategies that serve business-led digital transformation—rooted in clarity, purpose, and efficiency.
What we covered
✅ What AI strategy really is and when to build one.
✅ HOBA Tech’s six-step, business-first approach (5W1H framework).
✅ Efficiency tips, pitfalls to avoid, and comparative insights from UK government and industry thought leaders.
Ready to accelerate with clarity?
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👏 "Most companies fail with AI because they treat it like the destination. It’s not. It’s the vehicle" 🚀👨💼 #HOBA #AIstrategy #FutureOfWork🤖🔥
💬 Call to Action:
📝 AI Strategy Scorecard – Assess readiness and alignment
📚 AI Transformation with HOBA eBook – Step-by-step tools and templates for your six-step journey
🧑🏫 Webinar – AI Transformation for Business Transformation Professionals
📞 Or schedule a free discovery call to see how we can help you design a TOM that works – Schedule here
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🚀 "The real question with AI isn’t what tool to use, it’s what business problem you’re solving. Strategy comes first, technology follows" 🎯🤖 #HOBAtech #AIstrategy #BusinessTransformation
About HOBA Tech
If this resonated with you, discover how to make Business Transformation a reality—with less stress, fewer resources, and faster results. Explore our award-winning agile Business Transformation Framework, trusted by organizations worldwide, from the UK Government and FTSE-100 companies to innovative start-ups. Ready to begin your transformation journey? Start here.
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We’d love to hear your thoughts! Let us know in the comments what stood out to you or what topics you’d like us to cover next. If you found this valuable, share it with others who could benefit!
Thank you for reading, and here’s to your transformation success!
Sincerely,
Heath Gascoigne
P.S. If you want to join our Business Transformator community of 2,000+ like-minded Business Transformators, join the community on the Business Transformator Facebook Group here.
P.P.S. If you want to learn more about business transformation, check out The Business Transformation Playbook.
Heath Gascoigne
Founder & CEO, HOBA Tech
Digital Transformation CEO of the Year 2025
Author, The Business Transformation Playbook
Hi, I'm Heath, the founder of HOBA TECH and host of The Business Transformation Podcast. I help Business Transformation Consultants, Business Designers and Business Architects transform their and their clients' business and join the 30% club that succeed. Join me on this journey.
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