By: Lionel Moyal - co-founder of Growthguru.ai.

According to PwC's 2025 Global AI Jobs Barometer, industries most exposed to AI are experiencing significantly higher productivity growth, stronger revenue per employee and rising wage premiums for workers with AI-related skills. Perhaps most notably, jobs continue to grow even in roles traditionally considered highly automatable. According to Growthguru.ai, the question then is not how to make businesses more efficient with AI but how AI can drive true growth, unlock industry potential, and expand opportunity in an economy that urgently needs all three.

"From its onset, AI has been framed as a replacement technology, which is the perception that leads many people to missing its real value," says Lionel Moyal, co-founder of Growthguru.ai. "Businesses that are seeing meaningful value are those using AI to enhance human capability, improve decision-making and remove friction from execution, making AI a force multiplier for humans rather than a replacement for them."

For years, much of the global conversation around AI focused on a speculative narrative that automation will replace human work. This narrative has made for compelling headlines but overlooks a more important reality emerging inside businesses today: the organisations generating the most value from AI are not necessarily reducing their workforce – they are increasing the capability of employees.

This differentiation matters especially in South Africa.

“The challenge for many local businesses is not necessarily a lack of talent,” says Moyal. “It is a lack of capacity. Teams are expected to do more with less, experienced professionals are stretched across multiple functions, and small-to-medium-sized businesses often can’t afford the specialised expertise that bigger organisations have access to.”

AI changes that equation in three practical ways:

• A sales team supported by AI can identify opportunities faster;
• Marketing teams can run campaigns more efficiently;
• Business owners can gain access to strategic insights that would previously have required a team of specialists.

“AI has the potential to provide organisations with access to enterprise-grade capability by reducing the cost of capability," says Paul Bunting, co-founder of Growthguru.ai.

"For the first time, smaller businesses can gain access to the same level of intelligence, insight and execution support that have previously been exclusive to bigger organisations. This is particularly important in a market like South Africa, where entrepreneurial growth and small and medium-sized business success are critical to economic development, especially when viewed through the lens of employment.”

According to Growthguru.ai, South Africa doesn’t need technology that removes jobs. It needs technology that helps businesses grow faster, compete more effectively and create the conditions for sustainable employment over time.

“History has consistently shown that economies grow when businesses become more productive and competitive. The goal should therefore be to use AI to unlock growth rather than simply reduce cost,” adds Bunting.

Across industries however, organisations are finding that the biggest barriers to AI success are often not linked to technological aspects. Legacy systems, fragmented data, disconnected workflows and poor execution discipline are limiting the value that many businesses are able to extract from their AI investments. In other words, AI is exposing weaknesses that already existed within organisations.

"AI doesn't magically fix broken processes," adds Moyal. "In many organisations, it's doing the opposite. It is highlighting where workflows are fragmented, where decisions are delayed and where execution isn't aligned. The businesses that benefit most from AI are the ones willing to address those underlying issues."

“The organisations that thrive in the years ahead will not be those with the most AI tools. It will be those that best combine human insight with AI-enabled intelligence and execution. For South Africa, this should be the ultimate objective,” says Bunting.

"We should be asking how AI helps more people participate in growth, not fewer," Moyal concludes. "If we use AI to help businesses scale, help entrepreneurs compete and help employees become more productive, then technology becomes an enabler of economic opportunity rather than a threat to it."