Since 1994

Starting

AI adoption.

A sequence for mid-market engineering teams · Rex Black, Inc.

"We need to do AI"

is not a plan.


The board said it. Engineering owns it. Nobody specified the problem.

The flail response: task force, procurement binge, pilot that never leaves the notebook. None produce production AI.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE

The order

matters more than

the pieces.


Every step in this sequence is already in the industry's advice.
What's missing is the order, and the refusal to jump steps.

Teams skip from "we need AI" to "let's buy a tool", bypassing "what problem" and "what does success look like numerically."

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
Six stages

One through six.

No skipping.

Stages 1-3

1. Sponsor + problem.
One sentence, with a number.

2. Use-case selection.
Narrow. Baseline. Willing operator.

3. Instrumentation.
Today's number, measured.

Stages 4-6

4. Prototype + evaluation.
Release gate, golden set.

5. Productionize + rollout.
Canary. 1%. 10%. 100%.

6. Operate + extend.
Regression. Drift. Governance.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
01 / 06

Stage one.

Sponsor and problem.

"We want to use AI" is not a problem.

"Ticket resolution is 47 hours P50. We want it under 20." is a problem.


If the problem does not fit one sentence with a number, the sponsorship is nominal.

Send the leader back to the business before writing code.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
02 / 06

Stage two.

Narrow the use case.

Four properties that make use cases ship:

Properties

Bounded. Scope fits on a sticky note.
Baselined. Today's number is known.

Properties (cont.)

Operable. A named person will use it.
Reversible. Failure is recoverable.

Impressive comes later. After three boring wins.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
03 / 06

Stage three.

Instrument before you build.

The most-skipped stage. The one whose absence most reliably torpedoes the program.


No pilot without a baseline.

Two weeks of unglamorous measurement is the cheapest engineering in the whole sequence.
Without it, there is no before-and-after story for the sponsor in month six.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
04 / 06

Stage four.

Prototype and evaluate.

Architecture choice belongs here. Most mid-market features should start as workflows.

Evaluation discipline: 60-150-example golden set. Five dimensions. Release gate.


Two artifacts leave the laptop:
the evaluation suite and the release-gate thresholds.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
05 / 06

Stage five.

Productionize and roll out.

Not different from any other risky feature except the gate shape.

Canary. 1%. 10%. 100%. Each stage has named exit criteria.


Model choice becomes hot here. The flagship-for-everything default is where the cost surprise hides. Cascade routing is the answer.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
06 / 06

Stage six.

Operate and extend.

Regression

Weekly run. Known-good harness, production config, scored dashboard.

3-point drop = incident, not ticket.

Governance

Policy as code. Not a Confluence page.
Audit by sampling weekly.
Named incident response.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE

Four anti-patterns

that predict failure.


Patterns

The AI task force. Committee. No dated production commit. Ships nothing.
Buy before measure. Tool bought before the workflow is instrumented.

Patterns (cont.)

Model-first, not problem-first. Problems bent to fit a model.
Successful pilot, unclear path. The integration was never scoped.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE

The first

ninety days.


Days 1-45

1-10. Sponsor, problem, use case.
11-25. Baseline measured. Rubric drafted.
26-45. Prototype. Golden set. Architecture doc.

Days 46-90

46-60. Gates pass. Integration. Cascade design.
61-75. Canary. 1% cohort.
76-90. 10% cohort. Drift dashboard. Governance signed.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE

This week.


Force the order. If you are at stage 4 without stages 2 and 3, pause and go do them.
Make the problem specific and numerical. One sentence, one number.
Instrument before you build. If the team cannot tell you today's baseline, that is non-negotiable.

REX BLACK, INC. · AI ADOPTION SEQUENCE
Rex Black, Inc.

Sequence integrity

beats speed.

rexblack.com/resources/writing/ai-adoption-sequence