I’ve got concrete proof that AI isn’t just a fad or a buzzword.
I’ve got concrete proof that AI isn’t just a fad or a buzzword.
It’s a massive driver of change company-wide, for orgs that empower individual contributors to use it in day-to-day work, and reward them for using it to unlock productivity gains.
Over Q1 and Q2 2025, our marketing team saw a 5.8x average increase in speed to project completion, by finding creative ways to use AI.
I’m not just talking about small projects, either. AI has saved us over 10 sprints’ worth of work across the entire team, just in Q2 alone.
Here are some specific wins:
- Longform loss-leader content like market reports, which used to take 2+ sprints to produce, now takes 0.3 sprints (6.7x faster)
- Outreach to outlets and partners is now 5x faster, with no drop in response rate
- Creating case studies: 4x faster
- Developing sales battlecards: 10x faster
But marketing isn’t the only team that’s overhauled their workflows with AI. In fact, I have made it mandatory company-wide for all teams and individual contributors to find new ways of accelerating their work and 5x to 10x-ing productivity with AI
And it’s working:
- Sales is closing deals 40% faster with AI contract reviews
- Finance cut their monthly close rate from 2 weeks to 4 days
- Ops team processes 3x the contract volume with the same headcount
I’ve never seen technology transform work this rapidly. Not cloud. Not mobile. Nothing.
What’s different about AI?
It doesn’t create change – it accelerates it. For example, we’ve seen contracts moving from legal to finance teams for years. AI just compressed what would have taken a decade into months.
These stats are a call to action for SaaS leaders:
If you’re waiting for AI to be “perfect” before adopting it company-wide, you are already behind.
To catch up, start with one clear use case that solves a real problem (for us, it was contract analytics) and require everyone on that team to attack the problem with AI until they have achieved 5x or 10x speed to value.
Sounds like a tall order? It was, in the beginning.
But when team leaders began to see these wins – and especially when we rewarded individual contributors for solving with AI – we created internal champions who challenged other teams to match their performance.
In short:
- Pick a use case or bottleneck.
- Require AI innovation to solve it.
- Reward those who crack the problem.
- Repeat across every team in your org.
What’s your experience with AI so far? Are you getting real productivity gains, or still fighting against that bias that it’s just a fun novelty?
Matt Lhoumeau is the CEO and co-founder of Concord, a leading provider of Agreement Intelligence solutions. Concord empowers growing businesses to make smarter operational decisions by unlocking actionable insights from contracts, and is trusted by over 1,500 companies worldwide.
