Thinking

Legal went first. Now accounting, customer service, go-to-market and IT. The firms leading it don't sell AI — they take well-defined jobs off the client's hands, run them, and charge for the finished result. Eight characteristics, every time.

Most post-acquisition platforms integrate everything except the thing that sells. Cross-sell underperforms — and it's usually not the deal, and not execution. It's that nobody owns the commercial argument across the portfolio.

Governance used to be the last gate in an AI deal — legal and risk arriving near the contract to bless what you'd already won. That's over. For regulated buyers, "can we govern this?" has moved to the front, sitting beside "does it work?" and "can we afford it?" — and it's deciding who gets shortlisted before anyone's seen a demo. Here's what that shift changes about how you position, package, and sell.

Your client's software is priced on outcomes. Your firm still sells days. AI is turning the invoice into a test — and the chain is realigning.

Capability is now table stakes. What competes is the architecture that connects it to commercial outcome — and in most firms, no one owns it.