Free checklist
Twelve questions that tell you where to start with AI
Not a maturity score. Twelve yes-or-no questions a leadership team can answer in an hour, and the first move each "no" points to.
Ready means a first project will reach production
A business is ready for AI when a well-chosen first project will be used, rather than stall as a pilot. That depends on six things: leadership, access, data, knowledge, governance and skills.
Readiness does not need a data lake, a Chief AI Officer or a culture programme. It needs a short list of conditions, each of which holds or does not. The full reasoning is in the AI readiness checklist for UK businesses.
Answer yes or no, as a leadership team
| # | Question | If the answer is no |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Have we agreed what AI is for in this business, in one sentence? | A half-day leadership session, not a project |
| 2 | Is there a named owner, with time? | Name one before spending anything |
| 3 | Can we fund a first phase without a business case for the whole programme? | Agree a bounded first-phase budget with a decision at the end |
| 4 | Do staff have sanctioned access to an enterprise AI assistant, on business terms? | The cheapest, fastest move on the list: governed access |
| 5 | Do we know how AI is actually being used today? | A short, honest survey; it takes a week |
| 6 | For the use cases people talk about most, does the data exist, and do we know where? | A data check against those use cases, not a data strategy |
| 7 | Is that data reachable without a project? | Scope an extraction path as the first technical work |
| 8 | Do we trust our own numbers? | Start where the truth is unambiguous: documents, tickets, drawings |
| 9 | Is the knowledge we run on written down somewhere? | Capture before you automate |
| 10 | Is there a one-page AI policy that staff have read? | Adapt the AI policy template |
| 11 | Do we know which of our AI uses the EU AI Act would call high risk? | A morning's classification, using the AI inventory |
| 12 | Is there someone who can judge an AI system's output against the truth, in their own field? | Find the expert, and the hours, before scoping any build |
Count the yeses, then read the pattern
| Yeses | Reading |
|---|---|
| 10–12 | Ready. Run discovery, prioritise, and pilot the top opportunity this quarter. |
| 7–9 | Nearly ready. Fix the specific noes first; most take weeks. |
| 4–6 | Foundations first. A leadership session and governed access come before discovery. |
| 0–3 | Start with the conversation. One leadership session, then this checklist again. |
The number matters less than where the noes cluster. Leadership noes (1 to 3) mean nothing else will stick. Access noes (4 and 5) are the fastest to fix. Data noes (6 to 8) are the ones that most often sink pilots.
Five data positions
For each AI idea, say where its data stands. Ask the person who would have to fetch the data, not the person who proposed the idea.
Low dependency
Runs on tooling, not on your data. An assistant, a transcriber, a coding tool. The question is access, not data.
In hand
The data exists, you can get at it, and it is usable as it stands. Ideas here can start now.
Siloed
The data exists but sits unjoined across systems. The idea needs the join before it needs the model.
Partial
Some strands have data and others do not. It can start on the strands that exist.
Absent
The data does not yet exist. Nothing can be built until something is measured.
Your readiness ratio
Ideas in hand, divided by all ideas. About a third is normal, and more than enough for a first year.
Using the checklist
Who should answer it?
The leadership team together, in one sitting. Disagreement between directors on a question is itself an answer: it usually means "no".
We scored low. Should we wait?
No. Most noes point to a first move that takes weeks, and governed access to an AI assistant is usually one of them. A low score tells you what to do first, not whether to start.
How is this different from a maturity assessment?
A maturity score tells you where you sit on a scale. This tells you what to do on Monday, because every no comes with its first move.
Turn the answers into a plan
CONVERGE sets out how to go from readiness to a prioritised roadmap. Or we can run the checklist with your leadership team, as the start of a discovery programme.