Change Culture or Change Tools First? Binary Business - BB-12
A company spent $1.2 million on an AI platform. Six months later, adoption was at 8%. The frontline employees built a workaround in Excel. They chose a spreadsheet over a million-dollar platform. That's not a technology problem. That's a culture problem wearing a technology disguise.
In this episode, I break down how to diagnose whether your AI rollout needs a culture play or a tools play first, and why most leaders get the sequence wrong because they default to whichever one they're more comfortable with.
What You'll Learn:
• Why a maintenance crew ignored a predictive system that could see failures 72 hours out — then adopted it a year later (same tool, different approach)
• The firm that spent eight months on "AI readiness" while three competitors shipped AI products
• How one company spent $200K on change management when the real problem was a UI that looked like "a tax form and a spreadsheet had a baby and nobody loved it"
• The three-question diagnostic that tells you where to start
• Why "a culture shift with no tool produces meetings — and meetings don't ship"
• Forty-seven slides and a stock photo of a handshake (the digital transformation presentation nobody needs)
🎯 Download the free Binary Decision Scorecard: https://entrenovaai.com/scorecard
👍 Like this video and subscribe for more signal, no noise.
Timestamps:
0:20 - Context: The Debate That Never Ends
2:30 - Binary 1: Change Culture First
5:30 - Binary 0: Change Tools First
8:00 - ABCD Breakdown
8:15 - Audience: Are They Resisting the Change or the Tool?
10:30 - Build: Pilot Groups vs. Minimum Viable Deployment
12:15 - Convert: Slow and Sticky vs. Fast and Fragile
14:00 - Deliver: The Three-Question Diagnostic
16:00 - The Call: Fear vs. Frustration
About William Guidry:
Will Guidry is CEO and Founder of EntreNova AI, a Houston-based Microsoft Cloud Solutions Partner. He helps operators diagnose the real constraint in AI adoption — culture, tools, or strategy — using the Binary Decision Scorecard framework.
Previous Episode: BB-11 - AI for Speed or AI for Accuracy?
Next Episode: BB-13 - Trust AI Outputs or Require Human Review?
Binary Business is a business decision podcast for operators navigating AI.
Each 10-15 minute episode breaks one AI decision into a clear binary choice using the ABCD framework: Audience, Build, Convert, Deliver.
100 Episodes. 4 Seasons. One System.
Season 1 (Jan-Mar): Who AI decisions are for
Season 2 (Apr-Jun): How systems break when AI scales
Season 3 (Jul-Sep): Where AI moves money
Season 4 (Oct-Dec): How to execute AI decisions
New episodes drop every Tuesday & Thursday.
This isn't a podcast about AI hype. It's a framework for making high-stakes decisions in a world where AI is changing the rules.
Subscribe to follow the full arc. By Episode 100, you'll have a portable decision system that works for any business challenge.
🎯 Free Resource: Binary Decision Scorecard
https://go.binarybusiness.tech/gzkqjw9n-yt-pod-bb-01
💼 Work with Will:
https://app.usemotion.com/meet/willguidry/EntreNova-Will?d=30
🔗 LinkedIn:
https://linkedin.com/in/williamguidry
Binary Business. All signal. No noise.
