Why we built Riff
It’s not the ideas that are missing in business, it’s the decisions. They’re slow, political, poorly framed, or made by the loudest voice in the room. That’s where the real cost lies. People become demotivated to contribute or push for change.
In an era where AI could unlock unprecedented productivity, most employees are left feeling confused when we say ‘do more with less’. They stare at a box saying ‘ask me anything’ when knowing what to ask is half the problem.
The people giving the tick of approval don’t fare much better. Faced with a half-baked request, it’s often easier to delay a decision than to wade through the fluff and confusion that a clumsy GPT prompt has produced. Trust is already eroding.
Executives drift further from the reality of the situation because the people on the ground don’t get heard. Costs run over, business cases don’t get written, and opportunities for savings, growth and a most sustainable way of operating stay buried.
AI can change this. And yet the advice is often: “just use Copilot” as if the resurgence of Mr. Clippy in our documents somehow lifts everyone up. It doesn’t.
Technology alone doesn’t transform decision-making. People do, when they feel empowered to contribute, even if finance isn’t their language. And usually when they’re working together, not siloed in a Chat GPT conversation.
We believe better business decisions happen when financial and non-financial considerations form the foundation of the case too. Yet things like sustainability, nature and social impact end up as token dot points, not core to strategic thinking. We’re making sure these things are surfaced, even if people don’t know what to ask.
Riff is the place where people collaborate on better decisions that are approved faster. Instead of word docs, comments left everywhere, clunky decks and copy paste GPT responses, anyone can “start a riff”: an idea, a business case, a scenario. Agents help structure the doc, challenge thinking, source reasonable assumptions and run the right calculations. Colleagues add their perspective and the data they have. Stakeholders weigh in. Numbers are traceable back to their source. What emerges is sharper, faster, and decision ready outputs, backed by the full business context.
This isn’t just about better decisions today or saving hours on a business case either. Imagine a new starter joining your company. They sign into Riff and there, waiting, is the decision-making playbook of the organisation: every major business case, who wrote it, the key arguments, the assumptions, the rationale for approval or rejection.
Not hidden in SharePoint or G Drive. Not buried in email. They learn how the company thinks in a day, not a year. That’s institutional memory turned into a competitive advantage, finally in a format people can actually find and digest. (Because let’s be honest, have you ever successfully tracked down that PDF of the rationale for that one decision in SharePoint? Exactly.)
This is where we’re headed.
We’ve lived this problem. We were cost accountants and commercial managers writing cases, chasing inputs, and getting buy in from ops teams. We know how it feels when good ideas get lost in messy spreadsheets or ignored on a manager’s desk. And we know how powerful it is when decisions are made with clarity and confidence.
This is a new era. A home for good decisions for the whole business. An easy and accessible way to empower the whole team, saving them time and improving their skills.
Riff is built to help companies get shit done by making better decisions, every day, across every department.