AI TRAINING
AI Change Management for Family-Run SMEs
Lead AI adoption across generations without losing trust, culture, or tacit knowledge.
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Run the diagnostic →What it covers
A hands-on workshop designed for next-generation owners and managers in family businesses navigating AI adoption alongside legacy stakeholders. Participants learn how to communicate AI initiatives respectfully, protect institutional knowledge, sequence low-risk pilots, and avoid the cultural pitfalls that derail SME digital transitions. Sessions blend facilitated discussion, real SME case studies, and practical planning exercises. Attendees leave with a tailored AI rollout roadmap and a stakeholder communication plan.
What you'll be able to do
- Identify which business processes hold critical tacit knowledge and design a capture strategy before any automation begins
- Facilitate a structured conversation with senior or skeptical stakeholders that addresses their specific concerns about AI adoption
- Select and scope a first AI pilot that minimises cultural risk and demonstrates visible value to the whole team
- Produce a one-page AI rollout roadmap with sequenced milestones, communication checkpoints, and rollback criteria
- Recognise and correct the three most common change management mistakes that cause AI projects to stall in family businesses
Topics covered
- Understanding generational attitudes toward AI and automation
- Mapping and protecting tacit knowledge before automation
- Selecting low-disruption AI pilot projects in SME contexts
- Communicating AI initiatives to skeptical or senior stakeholders
- Avoiding 'disrespect-by-automation' and role-displacement anxiety
- Structuring a phased AI rollout roadmap for a family business
- Governance and decision rights in owner-led organisations
- Change readiness assessment for small teams
Delivery
Delivered as a one-day (7h) or two half-day (2×3.5h) workshop, in-person or live-virtual. In-person is strongly recommended for family business settings where interpersonal dynamics are central to the content. The session includes a pre-workshop stakeholder mapping exercise sent to participants one week in advance, group role-play scenarios, and a final roadmap co-creation session. All materials are provided in digital format. Hands-on activities account for approximately 60% of session time.
What makes it work
- Involving a respected senior family member as a visible co-champion of the first pilot
- Choosing a first use case that visibly reduces a pain point felt by long-tenured employees, not just management
- Running a short knowledge-capture session before any tool is deployed, signalling that experience is valued
- Communicating outcomes transparently after each pilot phase, including what did not work
Common mistakes
- Automating a founder's core tasks first, triggering loss of identity and resistance across the whole organisation
- Skipping the tacit knowledge audit and discovering too late that a retiring employee held critical undocumented processes
- Framing AI as a cost-cutting measure to staff, creating job-security fears instead of buy-in
- Letting next-gen leaders push AI adoption unilaterally without aligning older decision-makers, causing a trust breakdown
When NOT to take this
This workshop is not the right fit for a professionally managed SME with no family ownership dynamics, a dedicated HR change management function, and a workforce already comfortable with digital tools, those organisations should go directly to a practitioner-level AI implementation programme.
Providers to consider
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