Each year, we ask our High Growth Study participants to list their top business challenges. Since a global pandemic turned the world upside down in 2020, one theme has dominated the professional services landscape: uncertainty.
A lot changed in a short period of time—and five years later, we’ve adjusted to some of this change. Remote and hybrid work policies are now commonplace across the professional services. Many firms have either completed a large digital transformation or are well into the process. And organizations are finding ways to move forward in a topsy-turvy political landscape.
None of this is to say that we now live in a predictable world. But we may be adapting to its variability.
Why do I think this? Because that’s the story we’re seeing in this year’s High Growth Study. We’ve already discussed the top challenges facing professional services firms in this article:
Today’s article is dedicated to the single biggest shift we witnessed across professional services over the past year—and what it means for you.
In last year’s study, unpredictability was the strongest headwind buffeting the professional services marketplace. Four out of ten firms listed it as a top challenge. In this year’s results, those winds are still with us, but the gusts are a bit weaker.* It has dropped sharply from first place into third.
That’s an interesting development on its own. But just as fascinating is what’s taken its place.
The Rise of AI
In November 2022, OpenAI launched ChatGPT. AI had already been on the minds of some professional services leaders for a number of years, but its heyday seemed a long way off. ChatGPT changed everything. Suddenly, here was a mature AI product that could do amazing things—write computer code, draft high-quality emails, summarize long technical documents, even draft screenplays!
To say the world wasn’t expecting this level of sophistication would be an understatement. Quickly, other companies entered the fray, including Google and Meta, rolling out similar products of varying quality. By the spring of 2023, AI was dominating the news. Of course, it wasn’t all good news. Journalists, researchers and users discovered that the results weren’t always reliable, and occasionally the output was pure fantasy.
But the business world was warming to its promise. AI began appearing in more and more technology products, including many major platforms used by professional services firms. And a lot more was in the pipeline. Its promise seemed limitless. In our 2024 study (which explores the 2023 marketplace), we documented this rise. AI and its close cousin, automation, rose from an also-ran to become the second biggest business challenge of High Growth firms.
This year, it shot into the top spot—by a significant margin. Over half of firms in the sample cited AI and automation as a top challenge, compared to 37.3% for the next item on the list. That’s a whopping 35% difference!
Whatever your feelings about AI, one thing is for sure: it’s no passing fad. Billions of dollars are being invested in it, including major server and power generation infrastructure to support it.
What’s Next?
At Hinge, we believe that soon AI is going to become an organic part of the way firms like yours deliver their services, run their operations and market themselves. That’s why we are advising our clients to start experimenting and using this technology now.
Even today’s imperfect AI and automation tools offer tremendous potential to do things more efficiently and to make sense of the immense amounts of information that is available to us. Firms are using AI in ways that save countless hours on big tasks: uncovering patterns and trends in data, optimizing supply chain routes, identifying potential risks in workflows and predicting buyer behavior.
These tools are only going to get better. And new ones will enter the market that handle even more complex tasks. Those firms that embrace this revolution early will be positioned to profit from it most.
Okay. But What Can You Do Today?
How do you get started? The same way you handle any unfamiliar situation: You ask lots of questions.
If you are using technology platforms to run your business, chances are they either have AI functionality already included or they are available as add-on modules. Look at every part of your tech stack—from marketing and CRM to core operations and project management software—and determine where you have opportunities to add AI.
Talk to the developers about what these features can do. Ask about use cases: Explain your business and find out where AI can improve workflow, efficiency or even customer satisfaction: find out what new insights you can glean about your customers, and how to use that information to your advantage and theirs.
When you adopt AI, all the little efficiencies you gain can really add up. Easy-to-use tools like Gemini (Google’s AI chatbot), Copilot (Microsoft), ChatGPT (OpenAI), Perplexity (Perplexity) and Claude (Anthropic) can save minutes or hours on common tasks. If you have privacy concerns, many of these platforms have sandboxed versions that protect your data so that it won’t be exposed to their training algorithms.
At Hinge, for instance, we use a protected AI environment that is fully integrated into our full suite of office applications. While we have a policy that we never use AI to write thought leadership pieces (including this one, thank you), we encourage our team to apply it to tasks like drafting meeting outlines or summaries, analyzing complex data sets and even brainstorming ideas. We’re still learning ourselves, but for many on our team Gemini has been a revelation. We also make extensive use of our CRM’s marketing automation tools, from customized tagging and reporting to automated email sequences. Many of these tasks would be impractical or impossible without these tools.
The biggest thing you can do is make a commitment. A commitment to embrace AI, even if it isn’t always great right now. A commitment to invest in the training to deploy the software or features fully and to get your team up to speed. And a commitment to stick with it.
Organizational change is always hard. And adopting AI in a meaningful way is no different. But we believe making this investment today will set you up to thrive in a very different tomorrow.
*Keep in mind that each year’s study represents data collected in the previous calendar year. For example, the 2025 study presents a snapshot of the marketplace in 2024.
