AI ROI & Business Case Building
A 45-minute working session for FP&A, PMO, and strategy partners — building AI business cases your CFO actually signs.
Last updated: 2026-05-19
What you'll learn
By the end of this course you'll be able to:
- The four ROI patterns — and where each one actually shows up in real P&Ls
- How to quantify productivity gains without the magical-thinking discount
- Full cost modeling — infra, licensing, people, change, and the tail
- Risk-adjusted returns and how to present them honestly
- Two business cases walked through end-to-end — one that ships, one that shouldn't
- The 6 ROI traps that quietly kill credibility on case #2 and #3
Who this is for
FP&A business partners, PMO leads, transformation officers, strategy team members, and corporate development folks who get tapped to build the AI business case the CFO will challenge. Useful in regulated and capital-disciplined environments — banks, insurers, public-sector entities, large family groups across the GCC and India — where soft ROI claims don't survive the second review.
Curriculum
7 chapters · 2 hands-on exercises · capstone challenge
Each chapter ends with the learning objectives ticked off. Quizzes are auto-graded with feedback; exercises are open-ended and produce artifacts you can take to your team.
1. The four ROI patterns recap
- Anchor productivity, efficiency, growth, and risk-reduction ROI in concrete P&L lines
- Spot which pattern a sponsor is implicitly claiming before you start modeling
2. Quantifying productivity gains realistically
- Apply a defensible 3-step productivity quantification method
- Discount for adoption ramp, displacement reality, and "saved time that wasn't reinvested"
3. Cost modeling — infra, license, people, change
- Build a 4-layer cost model that captures the tail nobody scopes
- Spot the 3 cost categories vendors leave out of their TCO slides
4. Risk-adjusted returns
- Apply scenario-weighted NPV to AI initiatives without making it a math exercise
- Show downside and base-case in a single chart your CFO won't throw out
5. Two sample business cases walked through
- Walk through a contact-center AI assist case that survives finance review
- Walk through a "GenAI for sales" case that shouldn't — and learn why
6. Common ROI traps and how to disarm them
- Identify the 6 recurring ROI traps in AI business cases
- Build pre-mortem questions you ask the sponsor before modeling starts
Capstone: Capstone: Your AI business case template
- Draft a 1-page business case structure for your next AI initiative
- Define the 3 assumptions you'll require the sponsor to sign
Capstone deliverable: Every learner who completes this course produces «Your 1-Page AI Business Case Template» — a tangible artifact you take back to your organization.
Curriculum live · full chapter content rolling out through 2026.
The outline, learning objectives, references, and capstone deliverable are published. Full chapter content (video, narration, exercises) ships progressively. Get notified when each chapter goes live.
References & sources
Built on cited sources — not vibes.
Every course is researched fresh against vendor documentation, regulatory sources, and peer-reviewed work. Sources used in this course:
McKinsey Global Survey — The state of AI
McKinsey & Company · Source link
MIT Sloan Management Review — AI and ROI
MIT Sloan · Source link
Stanford HAI — AI Index Report
Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI · Source link
Course details
Track
Leadership
Level
Intermediate
Audience
Manager, Director, Executive
Industry
Cross-Industry
Stack
Stack-agnostic
Paired Gennoor Way phase
diagnose
Format
reading, video
You finished the course. Now what?
From course to outcome.
Reading this course is step one. The next step is applying it where you work. Here's how Gennoor helps — without the deck, without the pitch.
Run this for your team
A 2-day workshop or virtual cohort for up to 25 of your people, with exercises run on your data and a 30-day adoption plan.
From $5k · 2 weeks · function-specific
Apply this to your data
A 4–6 week pilot that takes what you learned and ships a working system inside your environment. Fixed scope, fixed price, code transferred day one.
From $25k · 6 weeks · production-grade
Just want to talk?
Free 30-minute call. No deck, no pitch. We listen to your situation and tell you honestly what makes sense — even if it isn't us.
Free · no commitment · 30 minutes
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