In this episode of Founders, Future, with host Mishal Saeed, we sit down with Ryan Stieg, founder and CEO of Finnovate, an AI consulting agency helping small businesses and real estate professionals streamline operations with practical AI tools. Ryan shares his entrepreneurial journey—from insurance and franchise gyms to real estate investing—and how identifying bottlenecks in his own ventures led him to demystify AI for time-strapped entrepreneurs. He reveals how Finnovate’s tailored audits uncover high-impact AI use cases, from automating knowledge bases to optimizing communications, while navigating the challenges of adoption resistance in traditional industries.

Ryan also dives into his "slow and methodical" approach to scaling, balancing personalized consulting with productized solutions, and why he’s building a developer network to bridge the gap between custom AI tools and client needs. From AI-powered calendars to voice-to-text tech, he shares game-changing tools for efficiency—and why the key to standing out in a noisy AI market is niching down and delivering undeniable value.