Tech with a Human Touch How founders are rethinking AI for 2026

As businesses brace for another year of technological change, founders across industries are recalibrating their strategies, to focus on sustainable growth and meaningful human impact.

For Scott Martin, founder of Unity Coffee, the next phase is about practicality. "In 2026, we're shifting from proving the concept to proving the economics," he says. "That means less focus on being the flashiest technology in the room, and more on building systems that actually work and do so reliably at scale. We're also realising that customers discover us on their phones now, not by walking past our locations, so we're building our thinking and activity around that reality. Most importantly, we're done chasing the fantasy of replacing people with robots. The real opportunity is using technology to handle the repetitive stuff so people can focus on creating experiences worth sharing. It's less exciting on paper, but it's what actually builds sustainable and successful businesses."

In the marketing and PR world, Petra Smith, founder of Squirrels&Bears, echoes the sentiment that technology is best when it frees humans to do what they do best. "AI in our industry has allowed us to automate a lot more, making our internal operations and client work significantly more efficient and cost-effective for our clients," she explains. Yet this efficiency comes with a paradox: the more technology takes over routine tasks, the more crucial human relationships become. "Our primary strategic focus for 2026 will be to allocate more time and resources to nurturing client relationships. What makes the real difference is that we truly 'get them,' their values, their culture, and their ambitions… They require us to be an extended part of their team and culture, demonstrating that we genuinely care about their success just as much as we care about our own."

Meanwhile, in the legal sector, Inspire Legal is turning a traditionally reactive model into a proactive, hybrid approach. Hannah Strawbridge, executive director at Inspire Legal Group and founder of Han Law, outlines a vision for 2026 centred on scalability and accessibility: "The biggest shift we're making is productising employment law. Traditionally, our work has been reactive and sometimes time-intensive, but next year we're scaling through fixed-fee legal update packages, AI-powered drafting support, and strategic partnerships with HR consultancies. It means we can deliver sophisticated employment law insight at speed and scale, freeing up our senior lawyers to focus on complex discrimination, whistleblowing, and litigation work... It's a move from purely service-based to a hybrid product plus expertise model, and it's already transforming our growth trajectory."

Natalie Foster, CEO at Inspire Legal, adds that technological efficiency must be balanced with human oversight: "We will also prioritise B2B relationships to encourage retainer agreements over one-off projects, while strengthening in-house controls instead of relying on outsourcing. Furthermore, we will conduct checks on AI processes to ensure a balance between efficiency and thorough sense-checking of information."

Across coffee shops, PR agencies, and law firms, the message is consistent: AI and automation are not ends in themselves. They are tools to streamline operations, but the competitive edge -and the real impact - lies in human connection, expert judgement, and strategic creativity. 2026, it seems, will be a year where founders use technology not to replace people, but to amplify what makes their businesses truly human.