‘They’re using it at home. Their kids are using it. They’ve been exposed to it. But companies don’t have a serious AI strategy for the frontline workers,’ says Bill Blum, CEO of Alpine Business Systems Inc.
As AI evolves at a faster and faster rate, Bill Blum doesn’t want his clients to fall behind. So instead of simply deploying Microsoft Copilot licenses and moving on, Blum is running structured, multi-session AI workshops for his clients.
“You can’t just drop AI down on an organization like it’s a new accounting system and say, ‘Click here, click there,’” Blum, founder and CEO of Bound Brook, N.J.-based Alpine Business Systems Inc., told CRN. “This isn’t transactional software. This is personal. It’s like handing someone a power saw without showing them where the on/off switch is, or how not to cut their finger off.
“They’re using it at home. Their kids are using it. They’ve been exposed to it,” he added. “But companies don’t have a serious AI strategy for the frontline workers.”
And that disconnect, he argued, is why so many AI initiatives stall. “I believe employees are already using AI, leadership just doesn’t know it.”
Blum, who started his MSP in 1987, recalled one client project where a promising AI rollout collapsed when a new executive stepped in and shut it down.
[Related: MSPs Share Real-World AI Customer Strategies: ‘You Have To Tie It To What Success Means For Them’]
“He said his team wasn’t smart or creative enough to use it,” he said. “He wanted 100 prompts ready-made. Or he wanted a tool that would solve a business problem today. But you don’t know the business problem until the team understands the tool.”
One employee in that group came prepared and showcased results where she analyzed a 400,000-line spreadsheet to uncover staffing inefficiencies that could save and generate significant revenue.
“She was a rock star,” Blum said. “But the others could have been too, if they’d been given the chance.”
At a different client’s introductory AI seminar, the company’s owner called Blum back within two days and asked for a proposal, as how to better use AI was all his staff had been talking about. By the second seminar, they were asking Blum about AI agents.
“One guy came back and said, ‘Twice this week, this tool blew me away. The time it saved me was incredible.’ And then he said, ‘This is life-changing,’” Blum said.
He said AI cannot be a one-time lunch-and-learn, but rather four sessions or more, evolving as capabilities shift. But before any of that works, he tells clients that they need to clean their data, which he sees as a major opportunity for MSPs.
And beyond technical readiness, he said the bigger hurdle is mindset.
“There are companies that won’t be around in 10 years because they don’t have the vision to do this now,” he said. “Some of my clients are struggling just to stay afloat this year. AI feels like a luxury to them. But the company that figures it out will make them irrelevant. That’s the part that troubles me.”
Internally, he’s practicing what he preaches. During an all-hands meeting with 29 employees, he required everyone to come prepared with how they’re using AI today, and one area of “drudgery work” that could benefit from an agent.
“All 29 had something,” he said. “Some more than others. But there’s a subset that’s really turned on by this, curious, thirsty for knowledge, open to change.
“The technology itself is curious,” he added. “It has a voracious appetite for data. If we bring that same mindset to it, we can interact with it in powerful ways.”
And for fellow MSPs, his message is to start within their own business.
“Do it internally first,” he said. “Give your C-suite the tools. Create cross-functional groups. Give people the space to experiment and share. We would never roll out a [Microsoft] Exchange server to a client without using it ourselves. This is the same thing.”
