A practical test for AI opportunities that deserve a pilot

Score AI ideas by workflow value, data access, evaluation, risk and adoption friction before model choice becomes the conversation.

Many AI backlogs are lists of interesting demos. A better opportunity map starts with work: decisions, handoffs, information retrieval, drafting, classification, exception handling and repeated judgment.

Five filters

• Value: Does the workflow affect meaningful cost, revenue, risk, speed or experience?
• Context: Can the system access the information required to do useful work?
• Evaluation: Can you tell whether the output is good enough at the task level?
• Risk: Can failure be bounded with human review, permissions and fallback?
• Adoption: Will the people in the workflow use it if the pilot works?

The best pilot candidates are not necessarily the most technically impressive. They are the ones where value is real, failure is governable and evidence can be produced quickly.