The 0–10 AI readiness framework, explained
A score is only useful if you know what it means and what changes it. This is the band-by-band breakdown of the 0–10 framework behind the AI readiness assessment: what each band looks like day to day, and the one move that takes a team to the next one.
Why a 0–10 scale
Because binary questions lie. “Does your team use AI?” gets a yes from a team where one person drafts emails with ChatGPT and from a team where every workflow is instrumented. Those teams need completely different advice. A scale separates them, and scoring per workflow rather than per team keeps the average from hiding your best opportunity.
The framework was built from work with 2,000+ event professionals. The bands describe what I actually see in teams, not an idealized maturity curve.
0–2Manual
What it looks like: Workflows live in people's heads and one-off documents. Finding last event's final timeline takes real digging. Nobody uses AI at work, or one person does quietly.
How it feels: Every event feels like the first one. The same problems get re-solved from scratch, and the team's best knowledge walks out the door with whoever leaves.
What moves you up: Documentation, not tools. Write down how the three most repetitive workflows actually run. A team that documents is a team AI can help.
3–5Experimenting
What it looks like: Individuals use ChatGPT or Claude for drafts and summaries, but nothing is shared. No common prompts, no templates, no measurement. Wins stay personal.
How it feels: Pockets of speed. One planner turns decks around in half the time and nobody knows how they do it. Leadership hears about AI but sees nothing on the P&L.
What moves you up: One workflow, made shared and repeatable. Pick the highest-hours, lowest-judgment task, build one team prompt or template, measure before and after. Most event teams sit in this band, and it is the fastest band to leave.
6–8Systematized
What it looks like: Several workflows are AI-assisted with prompts and templates the whole team uses. There is an owner, a place to share wins, and at least one real before/after measurement.
How it feels: The late nights before an event get shorter. New hires ramp in weeks because the playbook exists. The question shifts from “does this work?” to “where else?”
What moves you up: Consistency across events and the harder workflows: the judgment-heavy ones like sponsor strategy and content. This is where a structured sprint pays off, because the raw material is already there.
9–10Embedded
What it looks like: AI is part of how the team plans, executes, and reviews every event. Workflows are instrumented, hours saved are tracked, and the team improves its own system quarter over quarter.
How it feels: The team runs bigger events with the same headcount, or the same events with dramatically less overtime. Process is a competitive advantage, not overhead.
What moves you up: Very few teams are here, and the honest answer is most do not need to be. Past 8, the returns shift from hours saved to capability: doing things that were not possible before.
Scoring yourself honestly
Two failure modes. Teams overrate themselves when one enthusiastic person’s usage gets counted as the team’s (that is a 4 wearing a 7’s badge). Teams underrate themselves when they compare against AI-hype LinkedIn posts instead of against their own last quarter.
The calibration test: could a new hire reproduce the win from documentation alone? If yes, the capability belongs to the team and counts. If no, it belongs to a person. The 12-point checklist and the 17 assessment questions are both built to force that honesty.
Find your band in 3 minutes
The free self-assessment scores your team on this exact framework and names the hours you could recover, per task.
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