The task trap: Why AI's biggest promise has nothing to do with speed
Business value requires strategic domain expertise rather than task speed
by https://www.techradar.com/author/aviva-fink · TechRadarOpinion By Aviva Fink Published 14 October 2026
Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter
Every week, another headline celebrates how AI made some task faster. A developer wrote code 55% faster. A marketer generated a first-draft blog post in minutes. A product manager summarized a 200-page requirements document in seconds. These are real numbers.
But they are the wrong numbers to celebrate.
Aviva Fink
Chief Growth Officer at Siemens Digital Industries Software.
If you step back and ask the harder question — what actually creates enterprise value? — task speed is rarely the bottleneck. Where the value traffic gets jammed is almost always upstream, in the question that precedes the task:
Latest Videos FromTechRadarWatch full video here:
It’s not “What do we want IT to build?”
It’s “Why do we want IT to build it?”
It’s not “Why do we need that blog post?”
It’s “What content will drive business impact?”
Are you a pro? Subscribe to our newsletter
Sign up to the TechRadar Pro newsletter to get all the top news, opinion, features and guidance your business needs to succeed!
Contact me with news and offers from other Future brandsReceive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors