Your Team Is the Integration Layer: A Practical AI Readiness Check

The software is not the problem

Most operations teams we talk to are not short on software. They already run Salesforce or HubSpot, Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, an accounting package, and an ERP that was configured years ago.

The gap is the work in between. Someone reads an email, opens the ERP, checks an order, types a reply, and logs a note in the CRM. That person is doing the job an integration would do, by hand, many times a day.

Signs your team is the integration layer

• The same customer or order details are typed into more than one system.
• A shared inbox is the real queue for purchase orders or customer requests.
• Answers depend on which long-tenured person happens to be available.
• Reports are built by exporting to spreadsheets and pasting them back together.
• Nobody can say exactly how many hours a week this takes.

A five-question readiness check

Pick one process, not the whole company, and answer these honestly:

• Volume: does it happen at least a few times a day or dozens of times a week?
• Inputs: are the inputs digital (email, PDF, form, record) rather than paper or phone calls?
• Access: can the systems involved be reached through an API or export your plan supports?
• Review: is there a person who can approve outputs before they reach a customer or a ledger?
• Success: can you describe a good result on a real example in one sentence?

How to read your answers

Four or five yeses usually means the process is a reasonable first pilot. Two or three means there is preparation to do first, often around access or ownership. Fewer than two usually means a simpler fix, such as a form or a shared template, will do more than AI.

None of this assumes the system will be right every time. It assumes a person reviews the output and that exceptions go to someone who can resolve them.