How to Write a Brief for an AI Project (So You Get What You Actually Want)

Most AI projects go sideways not because the technology fails, but because the client and the implementer were imagining two different things. A brief — even a one-page one — eliminates most of that confusion before work starts.

Why Most People Skip the Brief

It feels like overhead. You have a problem, you know roughly what you want, and you’d rather just get started. The issue is that “roughly what you want” and what actually gets built are often far apart. A 15-minute brief conversation saves weeks of rework.

What a Good AI Brief Covers

The problem in plain English. Not “we want AI to improve our operations” — that’s useless. Try: “We spend 4 hours a week answering the same 10 questions from leads. We want those answered automatically without a human.”

The current process. What happens right now, step by step? Where does it break down? Where does it cost the most time or money?

The success metric. How will you know it worked? “Fewer hours spent” is a start. “Down from 4 hours to under 30 minutes per week” is better.

What you don’t want. Just as important as what you do want. “We don’t want it to respond to angry customers — a human needs to handle those.” These constraints shape the design significantly.

Who will manage it. Someone inside your business needs to own the tool after it’s set up. Name that person upfront.

A Real Example

A San Diego law firm wanted AI to help with client intake. Their brief: “We get 20–30 contact form submissions a week. Currently, a paralegal reads each one and routes it to the right attorney. This takes about 2 hours on Mondays. We want that automated. We do NOT want AI making legal assessments — just routing based on practice area keywords.”

That brief made the project simple. Without it, the conversation might have spiraled into document review or case summarization — which they weren’t ready for.

You Don’t Need a Formal Document

A brief can be four bullet points in an email. What matters is that you’ve thought through the problem, the current state, the goal, and the boundaries. That thinking is what makes the difference.

If you want help thinking through your problem before writing anything, book a free 30-minute call. We’ll work through it together.