The Reality Behind AI Adoption

Season 02

2026

HOW BUSINESSES ACTUALLY USE AI

Not the demos. Not the case studies the vendor wrote. 
The operators, named, with money on the line.

Every episode, an executive operator or business owner answers the same three questions on the record: what's working in AI, what's broken, and what still needs to be built.

10 industries so far. 24 AI product requests named out loud.

I don't make content about AI. I index what real customers want from it.

Watch the latest episode →

Close-up of a woman with long brown hair, red lipstick, wearing gold earrings and a black top with cutout sleeves, standing indoors with a neutral background.

HOST

Galina Fendikevich

Manufacturing · Logistics · Finance · Legal · Media · Hospitality · Defense · Fashion · Healthcare ·

Manufacturing · Logistics · Finance · Legal · Media · Hospitality · Defense · Fashion · Healthcare ·

Who this is for

two audiences. one conversation.

IF YOU BUILD AI

YOU CAN BUILD ANYTHING. THIS TELLS YOU WHAT'S WORTH BUILDING.

Your roadmap is a bet on what customers want. Most of the evidence behind it is founder-reported, vendor-produced, or 3 quarters old. This is primary research: named operators, in industries you've never worked in, saying out loud what they pay for, what they cancelled, and what nobody has built yet that they want to buy.

24 products requested, each in the operator's own words. They’d love to become a user.

Why deals stall, from the buyer's side: the integration quote that killed it, the objection you never heard, the pilot that died before onboarding

The words customers actually use instead of your own tech jargon — the vocabulary that decides whether they can find you at all

Search the Product Request Index

IF YOU RUN A BUSINESS

FIND OUT WHAT ACTUALLY WORKED FOR SOMEONE LIKE YOU.

Everyone is selling you AI. Almost nobody will tell you exactly what it costs, how long it takes, or where it breaks. These are operators in your position — running a real business, spending their own money — with the numbers attached.

What your peers actually pay for, named tool by named tool, and what they walked away from

What it really costs: the $30,000 lost to one missed step, the 83% payroll cut, the 45-page lease reviewed in three minutes

Where it fails and why — so it fails on someone else's dollar instead of yours

What to do first, not just what happened: every playbook ends in a recommendation

Read the stories for your industry

Every episode asks three questions. Every answer is a data point.

I.

What’s working

The tools operators rely on and pay for, named on the record.

"It took ChatGPT 3 minutes to review a 45-page commercial lease. It flagged 8 things that would've hurt me."

- Dr. Nikki Siso · Conscious Kitchen

II.

what’s broken

Where AI falls short in practice, and what it costs when it does.

"A client asked ChatGPT if he could anchor in 25 knots of wind. It said yes. I said: I don't care what ChatGPT says, you need to trust the captain."

- Jennifer Kerum · Anchor Croatia

III.

what still needs to be built

The product wishlist, stated directly by the people who would pay for it.

"If there's a 3-week lag in the information feeding into Claude, that's basically useless for building a media list."

- Sam Polstein · HAUS Agency

CONVERSATIONS from the front lines of AI adoption

11 episodes across luxury travel, legacy industries, public relations, hospitality, M&A, creative, restaurant, retail & events, and health & wellness. Every guest naming the tools they actually pay for and what tools they want.

Building AI? Here's market feedback
Running a business? See what your peers actually use

Sam Polstein on what why AI fails at building a media list

Sofiane Ghorbel makes an AI product request for luxury hospitality

Christine McDannell wants an M&A specific marketing tool

24 Products operators asked for and haven’t found.

Every request here came out of a real business with a real budget behind it. Search by industry, by problem, or by what you're already building. Each one carries the quote, the cost, and the operator who said they'd buy it.

Digital collage featuring images of women having discussions or interviews with bold headlines overlaid, such as 'AI Cost Me $30K,' 'Why They Won't Buy,' and 'Cut Payroll 83%.' The collage highlights industry sectors like restaurants, construction, M&A advisory, hospitality, yacht charters, and public relations, with smaller text descriptions and speaker labels for each segment.

Sample requests (live from the index):

  • A persistent, privacy-respecting client profile — asked for by 4 operators across 4 industries. Cross-industry.

  • Marketing that runs A to Z for specific domains — "so yes, Silicon Valley, please build this." · Chrissy McDaniel, M&A

  • Menu-matching for food sensitivities — "That would be gold. Gold, gold, gold." · Dr. Nikki Siso, Restaurants

  • A media list that knows what a journalist wrote this week — Sam Polstein, PR

  • Fleet search by what the client actually asked for — Jennifer Kerum, Yacht charter

Search the index
Building one of these? Let's talk

Who’s Been on the Show

Every guest actively buys and deploys AI inside a real business.

Not analysts. Not AI companies. Operators with payroll, customers, and something to lose.

Plus more guests coming up in Season 2!

i’d love to have these dream 100 guests on the show

If you know someone on it, I would appreciate an introduction. If you are on this list, this is your invitation. You're not on here by accident. I would love to hear your story of how you're ACTUALLY adopting AI and get your requests in front of the people building the tools.

A webpage header titled 'The Dream 100' featuring a list of industry leaders and executives, including their names, titles, and organizations, under a red background with white and black text.
Check out the list

hosted by

galina fendikevich

Wall Street machine learning → 1 exit to $9B company → led enterprise go-to-market for an AI unicorn → now interviewing the operators deploying AI every day

want to Collaborate?

Submit your inquiry and I’ll respond within 24 hours.