The AI Lie That’s Burning Budgets

Published 29 days ago • 3 min read

December 13, 2025 | Read online

The AI Lie That’s Burning Budgets

by Kevin 'KD' Dorsey

Everyone's talking about AI.
The board wants to hear your “AI strategy.”
Your competitors are posting about their AI integrations.
Your vendors are pushing AI like it’s magic in a box.

So most sales orgs, especially in SaaS, are sprinting toward adoption. New tools. New workflows. A new budget line with “AI” in the title.

But here's the uncomfortable truth nobody wants to say out loud: Most AI initiatives are going to fail. Not because AI doesn’t work. But because the foundation it's built on is broken.

And when you pour cutting-edge technology onto a weak foundation, all it does is expose the cracks faster.

AI Won’t Save Your Sales Org - It Will Expose It

The lie we keep telling ourselves is that AI will fix things. Fix our messy data. Clean up our processes. Make our reps better.

But that’s not how AI works. AI doesn’t fix dysfunction. It amplifies what already exists.

If your CRM is filled with bad data, AI just gives you faster access to incorrect information. If your process isn’t followed, AI scales the inconsistency. If your reps aren’t trained, AI won’t teach them - it’ll just help them say the wrong thing faster.

In fact, according to an MIT study, 95% of AI initiatives fail to deliver ROI. Not because the tools were bad. But because they were built on:

CRM data that’s 60% inaccurate
Processes nobody uses consistently
Disconnected systems
Teams lacking basic sales fundamentals

This isn’t a tech problem. It’s a readiness problem. And the cost of pretending to be ready when you’re not is steep.

You Can’t Automate Chaos

Let’s be honest: most teams aren’t ready for AI. They’re just hoping it’ll be the silver bullet that finally creates consistency or clarity. But you can’t automate what’s broken.

Before you think about rolling out another tool, the real work starts here:

1. Data Hygiene
If your CRM isn’t trustworthy, nothing else matters. You need standardized entry rules, rep accountability, and pipeline data that leadership can rely on without second-guessing. AI depends on inputs. Bad inputs = bad outputs.

2. Process Clarity
Do your reps actually follow your sales process? Is it documented, measurable, and coached consistently? If not, AI will just speed up whatever random playbook each rep is running. That doesn’t scale - it fractures.

3. Skill Baseline
Can your reps lead a discovery call without a crutch? Can they qualify properly? Articulate differentiated value? If they can’t, no AI overlay will fix that. Tools can support skill - but they can’t replace it.

Before You Ask “How Do We Do AI?” Ask This Instead

There’s a more useful question every GTM leader should be asking right now:

“Are we actually ready for AI?”

Because if you’re not, then jumping in is like trying to build a penthouse on top of quicksand. And worse - it gives you the illusion of progress, while your core problems remain unresolved.

Pretending you’re ready is how you end up with a massive spend, underwhelming results, and a new slide in the QBR deck explaining why it didn’t work. Again.

A Better Way to Measure Readiness

This is where ZoomInfo’s new AI Readiness Assessment comes in. It’s a 2-minute diagnostic built on that same MIT research.

It doesn’t just ask “Are you using AI?” It asks the harder, more important questions:

Is your data foundation actually clean?
Are your processes defined and followed?
Can your tools talk to each other?
Will your people actually adopt and use what you implement?

You’ll get scored into one of four categories:

Foundation Building (not ready yet)
Developing Readiness (you’re close)
AI Ready (green light)
AI Leader (best-in-class)

Most companies think they’re in “AI Ready” territory.
Most are actually stuck at “Foundation Building.”

That gap between perception and reality?
That’s where budgets vanish and ROI disappears.

Don’t Skip the Work. Do It Right.

There’s nothing wrong with not being ready. What is dangerous is pretending you are—and letting pressure or ego push you into rushed decisions.

AI works best when it’s implemented on top of a solid foundation: clean data, consistent process, and reps with real skill. Without that, all you’re doing is amplifying dysfunction.

So here’s the move: