AI Won't Fix a Broken Strategy

Align AI initiatives with measurable business outcomes to avoid scaling inefficient or wasteful efforts.
Shift organizational focus from high-volume feature output to meaningful long-term business impact and value.
Reduce system complexity by deliberately choosing which initiatives to stop or remove from portfolios.

AI is accelerating everything. And it’s moving faster than your strategy, which is a risk. Ideas move faster. Experiments scale more quickly. Delivery cycles compress.

On the surface, that sounds like progress. And in many ways, it is.

But there’s a deeper issue emerging, one that most organizations are only beginning to confront: Speed without alignment doesn’t create value. It amplifies waste. That’s the tension at the heart of today’s AI conversation, and it’s exactly what Matt LeMay, author of Impact-first Product Teams, explores in his session at the Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) Virtual Summit on April 29, 2026 at 11:00 a.m. ET.

If AI is making it faster and cheaper to build, why aren’t we seeing a corresponding increase in business impact? It’s a fair question, and one many executives are quietly asking.

Adoption is high, and nearly every enterprise is experimenting with or deploying AI in some capacity. Measurable returns, however, remain elusive. In fact, a 2025 MIT study showed that 95% of organizations see zero financial return on their AI investments. Leaders are left to wonder, "Why are my enterprise AI initiatives failing to deliver measurable financial returns?"

There’s a growing disconnect between what organizations are building and what actually generates value. According to Matt LeMay, that disconnect isn’t new. AI is simply exposing it.

The pattern that’s been there all along

Over the past decade, organizations have fallen into a familiar rhythm: teams prioritize small, low-risk enhancements, with features that are easy to justify, fund, and deliver. Individually, these small, incremental projects seem harmless, even beneficial. Collectively, however, they create something else entirely: a labyrinth of complex products, intricate interdependencies, and high coordination costs. Over time, the system becomes increasingly harder to change in meaningful ways.

Matt LeMay calls this the “low-impact death spiral.” It’s a pattern in which the more you build, the harder it becomes to build anything that truly matters. You can see this for yourself specifically on page 12 of his book, Impact-first Product Teams.

AI doesn’t fix the problem. It exacerbates it.

AI removes friction from the system. It allows teams to build faster, experiment more and produce more output with less effort. But if the underlying system is misaligned, AI doesn’t correct it; it scales it.

If they aren't careful, organizations can leverage AI to not only build the wrong things, but also do it faster, cheaper, and in greater volume. When that happens, hidden costs like maintenance, dependencies, defects, and coordination overhead quietly spike.

Although these costs rarely appear in business cases, they accumulate and quietly erode the very value organizations are trying to create. (See a prior post and find out how operational blindness is contributing to these challenges in many organizations.)

Rethinking what “progress” actually means

For years, organizations have equated progress with output. The goals have, incorrectly, always been centered more:

More features shipped
More initiatives launched
More velocity across teams

The data, however, tell a different story. Building more does not guarantee higher returns. In fact, in many cases, it does the opposite.

Some of the highest-performing organizations are not those doing the most. They’re the ones making more deliberate decisions about what to do, and are:

Prioritizing fewer initiatives
Aligning work to clear enterprise outcomes
Removing complexity instead of adding to it

Running a more efficient, thoughtful doesn't mean you have to go it alone. Strategic portfolio management (SPM) is an essential tool in successfully scaling your organization's AI initiatives.

The shift from output to impact

The challenge isn’t adopting AI. It’s ensuring that AI is applied in service of real business outcomes. That requires a shift in how teams in organizations think about planning and investment decisions.

In short, it requires SPM.

How can strategic portfolio management help align AI projects with actual business outcomes? Instead of asking how much they are building or how fast they are delivering, leaders employing SPM can ask bigger strategic questions about impact, the true cost of work, and what they should stop doing.

Because often, the highest-return decision isn’t what you add to the portfolio. It’s what you remove.

Why this conversation matters now

AI has created a moment of urgency. The pace of change is increasing, and the margin for misalignment is shrinking. What used to be inefficiencies are now becoming strategic risks.

Organizations that fail to connect strategy, funding, and execution will not just move slower. They’ll move faster, but in the wrong direction.

That’s why Matt LeMay’s session at the SPM Virtual Summit is so timely. It doesn’t focus on the promise of AI. It focuses on the discipline required to ensure AI actually delivers value.

A different kind of AI conversation

At this year’s SPM Virtual Summit, the conversation isn’t about tools or trends. It’s about how leaders achieve these objectives:

Align investments to measurable outcomes.
Understand the full cost of their portfolios.
Make smarter decisions in an environment in which capacity is no longer the constraint.

The real question isn’t whether your organization is using AI. What leaders need to ask is if AI is helping them make better strategic decisions, or is it simply helping them move faster.

AI is changing the rules, but it’s not rewriting the fundamentals of value. If anything, it’s making them more visible. The organizations that succeed in this next phase won’t be the ones that build the most. They’ll be the ones that have leaders who understand what to build, what to fund, and what to stop.

If you’re responsible for portfolio decisions, Matt LeMay's session at the 2026 SPM Virtual Summit will change how you evaluate every AI investment.

Frequently asked questions

What is the "low-impact death spiral"?

It is a pattern in which teams prioritize small, low-risk enhancements that collectively increase complexity and coordination costs, eventually making meaningful change harder.

Why doesn't AI automatically improve business outcomes?

AI removes friction and increases delivery speed. However, if the underlying strategy is misaligned, AI simply produces more output without correcting fundamental strategic flaws.

How can leaders ensure AI investments deliver real value?

Leaders must shift from measuring output volume to asking about strategic impact, the true lifecycle cost of work, and what projects should be stopped.