How small businesses are using AI to do more with fewer staff

Smaller teams gain extra capacity

A survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco found that nearly 40% of small businesses surveyed in 2024 were already using or planning to adopt artificial intelligence. In the United States, Butternut AI reduced its workforce from nine to four employees, with AI agents taking over some tasks previously performed by engineers. The company claims to have reached 10,000 paying customers.

Another example is Lindy, a company that provides AI agents to businesses. Lindy reduced part of its marketing team and began using automated tools for specific tasks, retaining only two professionals in the department.

The economic rationale goes beyond simply replacing an employee with a tool. A single AI system can perform tasks at different times, serve multiple customers simultaneously, and handle repetitive work without the need for new hires every time demand increases.

Customer service, marketing, and finance are entering the automation era

The easiest functions to automate are those with relatively predictable processes. An agent can receive a customer request, consult available information, draft a response, and forward the case to a person when a decision or specific knowledge is required.

In marketing, AI can transform product data into text, campaigns, and content variations. In finance, it can organize documents, identify charges, or monitor routines. The level of autonomy depends on the tool and the access granted by the company.

A study by Upwork involving 195 leaders of small and medium-sized American businesses indicated that, by 2026, companies with 10 to 99 employees were testing agents in various areas. However, the results were still described as incremental gains rather than a complete transformation of productivity.

The cost shifts to software and supervision

For small businesses, the main change is in the cost structure. Hiring an employee involves salary, benefits, and other employment-related expenses. Using an agent involves costs for software, processing, integration, maintenance, and, most importantly, someone capable of supervising the work.

As a result, a company can grow without expanding its team proportionally, but this does not mean that human work will disappear. As operations become more complex, tasks arise that require negotiation, judgment, relationship-building, and responsibility for decisions.

OpenAI identified millions of people in the United States using ChatGPT to help start or run small businesses, demonstrating that the technology serves as an additional capability for entrepreneurs who juggle multiple roles.