The daily publication · October 25, 2026 · Small business

Goldman will teach owners AI. Only 15% have actually wired it in

By Tabron Merryhill · The Workflow

Most owners have tried AI by now. Very few run on it. That gap is the whole story.

The idea

Goldman Sachs announced October 22 a Small Business AI Institute. It is part of a $500 million expansion of its 10,000 Small Businesses program, which Goldman says has graduated nearly 20,000 entrepreneurs since 2010. Anthropic, Google, Meta and OpenAI are partners. The institute has three parts: AI education for owners, research on how small businesses use AI, and AI-enabled access to capital.

The numbers behind the announcement are the interesting part. Goldman surveyed 2,473 program alumni for its October 2026 report, "The AI Economy Is a Small Business Economy." AI use among graduates rose to 86% in 2026, up from 56% in 2024. But only 15% said they had fully integrated AI into core operations. And 74% of AI users have no formal policy governing how employees use it.

Use is also shifting. Marketing content, the first job most owners gave AI, is down to 65%. Financial analysis and business planning are up to 42%. Owners are moving AI from the poster to the books.

The example

Picture a shop owner who uses a chatbot to write social posts and answer the odd customer question. That counts as using AI. It does not change how the shop runs.

Now picture the same owner with AI inside one core job. Quotes go out from a template the owner approved. The books get reconciled on a schedule the owner set. Staff know what they may and may not paste into a chatbot, because the rule is written down. That is integration, and it is what only 15% have done.

Here is the fair counterpoint, and it comes from Goldman's own numbers. Training has not yet become workflow change. Most graduates are still experimenting, and three quarters of AI users run without a policy. A training program from a bank and four tech giants will arrive with those vendors' defaults baked in. The owner question is not whether to learn AI. It is which curriculum, which defaults, and whose policy template you adopt when you do.

The next step

Do not sign up for a course this week. Write one page first.

Name the one core job AI will touch in your business. Name what staff may and may not put into an AI tool. Name who approves the output before it reaches a customer or a ledger. That page is your policy, and it is the difference between the 86% who use AI and the 15% who run on it.

Then pick the training that fits that page, not the other way around.

Want help writing that one-page AI policy for your shop before you adopt another tool? A free 10-minute workflow conversation will map the job, the rule, and the approver. No pitch, just the map.

Sources: Goldman Sachs, https://www.goldmansachs.com/pressroom/press-releases/2026/goldman-sachs-commits-500-million-to-launch-small-business-ai-institute; Morningstar, https://www.morningstar.com/news/dow-jones/202610227307/goldman-sachs-to-put-500-million-toward-boosting-ai-use-at-small-businesses; AI Affairs, https://www.aiaffairs.com/corporate/goldman-sachs-small-business-ai-institute-500-million-expansion/. Opposing view: AI Affairs, https://www.aiaffairs.com/corporate/goldman-sachs-small-business-ai-institute-500-million-expansion/.