Door One: Avoid – The Overlooked Path to Business Success

Many leaders in today's businesses and organizations feel the pressure to “do something” with technological innovation, especially AI. Boardrooms are buzzing, pilot projects are launching, and vendors are promising transformation. Yet, according to a major MIT study, 95% of AI pilots fail, not because the algorithms don’t work but because the problems they aimed to solve were never worth the effort in the first place. Companies often rush to automate or optimize without first asking the most critical question: should we even be doing this work at all?

This post is the second in our series exploring the Three Doors Framework, a structured approach developed by Voyage Advisory to help leaders navigate transformation in an age of technological complexity. Click here for an overview of the Framework as a whole and here for an even more detailed talk on the subject by Voyage Advisory founder, Andrew Studee. The first door is Avoid, where meaningful transformation begins. "Avoid" does not imply resisting innovation; it means stepping back with discipline and clarity before charging forward, challenging legacy processes to decide which problems are truly worth solving with some form of automation, including technology like AI.

A key advantage of this approach is that it directly confronts what researchers call “the addition bias,” our natural tendency to add new processes, reports, or tools instead of removing what is unnecessary. In many organizations, inefficiency hides in plain sight: duplicate documentation, redundant approvals, reports that no one reads, or workflows that exist simply because they always have. By removing that noise before considering automation, workforce teams immediately gain increased capacity, reduced frustration, and improved morale without writing a single line of code. Avoiding unnecessary work gives leaders breathing room to focus on the initiatives that truly matter, the ones that drive customer value, measurable ROI, and long-term impact.

The takeaway for today’s leaders: You don’t need to chase implementation of every new tool; you need clarity on what not to do first. Identifying and eliminating unnecessary work establishes a foundation where every future investment in technology like AI is intentional, efficient, and aligned with your organization’s mission. Continue following the Three Doors Framework series to see how disciplined avoidance naturally leads to effective automation and optimization, or reach out to the Voyage Advisory team to discover how these principles can shape your organization’s transformation journey.

Sources:

1. MIT, “State of AI in Business: 95% of AI Pilots Fail,” Challapally et al, 2025.

2. Nature, "People systematically overlook subtractive changes," Adams et al, 2021.