A retrospective on five years of business AI — what actually changed, including how open-source models caught up with the frontier — and what organisations still struggle with, alongside practical guides on choosing a first AI project, enterprise delivery and the FORT method. Published now; the period covered is shown separately on each article.
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Five years of business AI, one article per year: what actually launched, what changed for operators, and where organisations still get stuck. Milestones are sourced; our reading of the trends is labelled as ours.
Period covered: 2022
On 30 November 2022, OpenAI released ChatGPT — and AI moved from a specialist topic to something any director could try in a lunch break.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Period covered: 2023
GPT-4's launch in March 2023 raised the ceiling on AI-assisted writing, coding and analysis — and made verification and data handling first-order business concerns.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Period covered: 2024
GPT-4o's May 2024 announcement brought documents, images and voice into everyday AI use — and widened what businesses could hand to a model.
Published 29 October 2026 · 6 min read
Period covered: 2025
In 2025 the models learned to act, not just answer. The hard problems of AI moved from prompting to permissions, tools and escalation paths.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Period covered: 2026
Adoption keeps rising, but dependable operational AI remains rare. The gap between buying tools and building capability is where most programmes stall.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
FORT is Cooper Agile's delivery method: four stages that turn a business problem into a defined, tested, handed-over outcome in focused delivery cycles.
Published 29 October 2026 · 6 min read
Practical guide
Employ, agency, or fractional senior engineers? An honest comparison of the three ways an established SME can get a technical outcome — and when each is right.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Why does a software consultancy name itself after battle formations? The story behind FORTs, Foot Soldiers and the phalanx — and the operating model the metaphor exists to make memorable.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
A practical decision guide for choosing a first AI project you can baseline, measure and complete — and the workflows to avoid.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
When success can't be measured, organisations reward what they can see: activity, hours, confidence. The measurement vacuum — and the PHAT lens that fills it honestly.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
What should happen the moment a key number goes wrong — and to whom? Results-based monitoring: KPIs with thresholds, owners and pre-agreed actions, not decorations.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Tired of analytics rent and black boxes? Self-hosted, open-source measurement — analytics, monitoring and telemetry your business actually owns.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
A calm, practical triage guide for business owners whose single developer, freelancer or small agency has just exited — and how to reduce the risk next time.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
You have a team or vendor building software, but can you independently judge their progress and quality? What an authorised second opinion looks like — and what it is not.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Considering technical oversight but can't picture the deliverable? A section-by-section walkthrough of the monthly report a non-technical owner can actually act on.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Stuck with a business-critical system nobody understands? Assisted reverse engineering, AI-assisted analysis and the rescue map — understanding before you maintain, integrate or replace.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Your website was fine a few years ago. It probably isn't now. How sites decay invisibly, the symptoms owners miss, and the maintenance rhythm that keeps a site working.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Why every small fix takes longer than the last: technical debt as a business concept — how it compounds, why rewrites usually fail, and how to pay it down incrementally.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
The quote-to-cash trail is full of paid hours spent moving numbers by hand. Where finance admin leaks time, and what automation looks like step by step.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
Paying for SEO, content or ads without trustworthy measurement? How to build tracking you can trust, separate vanity from business metrics, and judge the work honestly.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read
Practical guide
When a focused external senior team beats a large consultancy engagement — and how to structure bounded assignments with clear acceptance criteria.
Published 29 October 2026 · 5 min read