Earlier this year, markets did something unusual. They repriced software - not because a cohort missed earnings, but because a product release felt like a business model threat. After Anthropic launched a new automation tool, investors sold off software stocks on the view that AI can now run workflows, not just assist them.
The inbound that followed from LPs and fund managers was telling: what’s actually driving this, and how are startups suddenly disrupting incumbents faster than incumbents can respond?
My answer is simple, and slightly uncomfortable for large organisations: AI is not the strategy. It’s the amplifier. And the thing it amplifies most aggressively is organisational design.
The hidden tax was never effort rather it was coordination.
A lot of SaaS economics were built on seat-based pricing and the assumption that switching costs would stay high enough to make lifetime value (LTV) predictable. AI challenges both. When teams can change tools and models quickly, the productivity layer lifts above any single vendor. LTV becomes harder to forecast, reducing the need to commit to one stack for years.
In knowledge work, output rarely scales linearly with headcount. The real drag isn’t effort. It’s coordination: the reviews, approvals, handoffs, rework, and ambiguity that force people to spend time confirming what should already be clear. AI compresses that. When the first draft becomes cheap, the team that decides quickly becomes disproportionately advantaged.
Incumbents don’t lose because they’re dumb. They lose because they’re slow. And slowness is often a design choice.
Alignment isn’t a culture initiative - it’s a competitive advantage.
Patrick Lencioni’s The Advantage argues that organisational health - not strategy, not technology - is the ultimate competitive advantage. The most effective organisations are those where leadership is cohesive, clarity is shared, and that clarity gets reinforced consistently at every level. It’s not glamorous work. But it’s the work that determines whether everything else compounds or collapses.
In the context of AI, Lencioni’s framework has never been more relevant. AI doesn’t fix misalignment. It amplifies whatever a team already is.
If you’re aligned, AI multiplies shipping. If you’re misaligned, AI multiplies noise. More meetings, documents and dashboards. More “alignment work” that only exists because alignment doesn’t. It’s like a chaotic startup raising a big round and going on a hiring streak to put out fires - nothing becomes clearer, you just accelerate the existing dysfunction.
Real alignment is mechanical. Shared goals that are stable enough to matter. Priorities explicit enough to say no with ownership clear enough that work doesn’t boomerang between teams. Decisions pushed far enough down that the people closest to the work can move without permission slips. When that’s true, AI feels like a cheat code - not because it makes people smarter, but because it collapses the sludge between intent and output.
Organisational health is table stakes.
The market selloff was framed as a valuation story. It’s more useful to read it as an organisational story. AI is making design constraints visible, and in doing so, it’s making alignment - or the absence of it - something investors can increasingly price.
At Giant Leap, we look for founders who understand this distinction. Not just founders building with AI, but founders building organisations that can survive amplification. The ones who want to do the unglamorous work of getting their house in order.
Because here’s the uncomfortable truth for incumbents: the best AI strategy might start with a non-AI intervention. Get clear on what you’re actually trying to do, clarify ownership and shorten the distance between action and feedback. Then amplify.
The winners won’t be the companies with the most AI. They’ll be the companies whose operating systems are aligned enough to integrate and capitalise on it.
Capital is a force multiplier and so is AI. Both compound resilience in healthy organisations and both accelerate fragility in broken ones. The question for founders and investors alike isn’t whether to adopt AI - it’s whether your organisation is ready for it.
The organisations best positioned to survive amplification are also the ones most likely to use it well. For founders solving the world’s most pressing problems across climate, health and people, alignment isn’t just a growth lever - it’s the precondition for building something that actually matters.
