AI is not a software problem. It is a people problem.
SPAIK is a Dutch AI consultancy and training company, founded in 2024 in Amsterdam. We build AI that mid-market companies actually use, and we train the people who take it over from us.
From the founder
People, change and technology. Those three always interested me most, but I never quite got hold of the third one. At Randstad I built customer experience from nothing, after that I helped companies speed up their processes. It was always about behaviour, and the technology always stayed at arm's length. Until AI came along. The first technology I understood, and the one that made the bridge buildable. That is why SPAIK exists.
What I run into most since then is not a technical problem. It is fear, and it is almost never said out loud. Am I making my own work redundant? Will I still be needed here in a year? That question sits underneath nearly every rollout that stalls, and while nobody asks it, nothing changes.
I have learned not to take that discomfort away too quickly. As long as it stays clear where the friction really is, the answer usually comes from the group itself. So my first question is not which tool you need, but what you are proposing to your people. If a machine takes over part of their work, what is the trade? What do they get back, what will they do instead, and who says that out loud?
Guardrails belong with that. They sound like a brake and they do the opposite: they make new behaviour obvious and old behaviour impossible. Without them everything stays non-committal, and non-committal is exactly how you lose a year.
And that is where the opportunity sits. You will not stand out because of the AI you have, everyone will have that. You stand out by where you put your people: on the work that actually matters.
Where this has to end up is you not needing us. We are not here to keep doing it for you; everything we build we hand over. You do not get there on your own. You need someone who reads a process, someone who builds, and someone who keeps a department going when it gets awkward. Those eleven people are further down, and they are the reason this works.
Jochem van Laren, founder
LinkedIn
What goes wrong almost everywhere
Hand out licences, run a training session, hope adoption follows. It is what most organisations do. We tend to arrive after it has gone wrong, and we see the same thing every time: most of those licences sit unused after the first month. Enthusiasm peaks around week three and then collapses, because the output is too generic, too often wrong, or simply not usable.
And the other side of it is bigger than people expect. The ones who really adopt AI do not get a fifth faster; they start doing different work, the work that used to be left undone. That is where the difference comes from, and the gap widens every month.
So what do we do differently
We start with interviews, not with tools
Before you can free people up, you have to see how the work really goes. Not the version in the process documentation, but the handoffs, the workarounds, the exceptions that run on tribal knowledge. That knowledge lives in people, not in systems, and picking up on it is human work.
We build alongside your systems, not inside them
Customising an ERP is a bigger investment and leaves you less room to change your mind. So the automation sits next to it: your system of record stays the source of truth, the AI reads, interprets and prepares.
We train the people who take it over
Handover is not the final step of a project, it runs from day one. Internal AI leads learn to build and improve, and colleagues in IT manage the platform. Our last day should not be the day it stops working.
Where it blocks, and how you see it
Leadership × Culture × Tooling × Frameworks = Impact. It is a multiplication, not a sum. If one factor is zero, the result is zero. That is why we use it as a diagnostic in every first conversation.
Leadership
Rudderless
Pilots without priority, nobody making the call, AI as a nice experiment.
Culture
Non-committal
Tools nobody uses, training without application, "we gave it a try."
Tooling
Stuck
Enthusiasm without execution, ideas that run aground on technical limits.
Frameworks
Exposed
Sprawl, unclear expectations, your best people dropping out in frustration.
That it works
Four projects we are allowed to describe in full, each with the number we measured.
I knew how important AI would become for Movir, but not how to go about it. SPAIK was a genuinely great business partner in that, and worth more than the investment.
The SPAIK Team
Senior experts with over 10 years of experience in tech and transformation. More than 35 implementations. No juniors learning at your expense, we deliver from day one.
Clients we've worked with
We work with Dutch mid-market companies and a handful of corporates, including SIG Benelux, Movir, Heineken, De Hypotheker, FedEx, Philips, BAM Wonen and Nationale-Nederlanden. A non-exhaustive list of named clients:
Trusted by Heineken, De Hypotheker, BeFrank, Movir, FedEx, Philips, and BAM Wonen. 35+ implementations, 700+ people trained, rated 9.1/10.
Get in touch
Spaik B.V. is registered in Amsterdam (KVK: 95243763). Office: Erasmusgracht 7-3, 1056 BB Amsterdam. For consulting and training enquiries, email info@spaik.io or message us on LinkedIn.
Discover if we're a match?
After 30 minutes, you'll know what AI can deliver for you and whether we're the right fit. Honest, no sales pitch.